Some other good news on the topic of one of the other Oscar candidates, "Paperman" has appeared online for all of us to see! You can find it here.
Head Over Heels
Synopsis:
The short synopsis (from the presskit document): A husband and wife can’t agree which way is up. He lives on the floor, she lives on the ceiling, and their marriage hangs in the balance.
The long synopsis (from the Vimeo page of the trailer): After many years of marriage, Walter and Madge have grown apart: he lives on the floor and she lives on the ceiling. When Walter tries to reignite their old romance, their equilibrium comes crashing down, and the couple that can’t agree which way is up must find a way put their marriage back together.
Random info (from the films website):
Head over Heels is a 10 minute stop-motion animated short film written and directed by Timothy Reckart at the National Film and Television School in the UK. A team of eleven students made the film over the course of 15 months as a graduation project.
Behind the scenes (from dragonframe blog):
Credits (mostly from Vimeo):
Official Academy Award nominees: Timothy Reckart and Fodhla Cronin O'Reilly
Written & Directed by TIMOTHY RECKART
Produced by FODHLA CRONIN O'REILLY
Cinematographer CHLOË THOMSON
Production Designer ELEONORE CREMONESE
Editor JAMES TAYLOR
Sound Designer AXLE KITH CHEENG
Music Composed & Performed by JERED SORKIN
SFX Supervisor JENNIFER GROVES
VFX Supervisor & Colourist HELEN BROWNELL
Production Manager LIZZIE BULL
Script Editor TOM HILL
© National Film & Television School 2012
The film, or the trailer:
My personal say on it:
So once again, we're unfortunately left to judge a short film by its trailer.
The trailer is easy enough to understand. It's about a marriage that is on the verge of breaking. The man and woman have grown apart so much, they disagree so much, that one is now living on the ceiling and the other on the floor. In disagreement they live in the same house and barely tolerate each other.
The whole situation is based on a metaphor used literally, which has a real charm.
The way these characters act in each others presence is kept very simple. Their relationship becomes clear to us from the way they frame their shots and how the characters do the things they do. So even if they don't speak or look at each other, you know what is going on. It's so clear because they kept it simple. The simpleness also caries through in the animation. It's just enough to tell the story.
I've never really liked the look of claymation, it's just my personal opinion. In this clip however, it's only secondary to the story. It's there, but it's not the most important thing. I do very much like the color scheme, it fits the characters.
What makes this absolutely amazing is most definitely the cinematography. The compositions, progressions, the framing, everything is top notch. I think this might actually be a contender with the other short films, so it's turning out to be quite a strong list of nominations this year!
The problem I have now with comparing this to Adam and Dog is that I don't know what the plot is like for either of them and how successful they are about bringing their stories to a close. Also, it's hard to compare a situation that is more realistic and easy to relate to (bad marriage/relationship) to a situation where the main characters take you exploring a whole new world. Both sound exciting and promising to me, so as of yet I wouldn't be able to tell you which one is my favorite. We'll just have to see what the other two Oscar candidates bring us!
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