Here’s more of my coverage on the animation at this year’s Tribeca Festival, with the first part of the article available here.
Whale 52 – Suite for Man, Boy, and Whale is a short by Daniel Neiden, but the actual animation style is unmistakably that of Bill Plympton. Even just saying his name conjures up an image of a very specific type of animated short: surreal, sick, twisted, hilarious. So it was a massive surprise that Whale 52 is actually one of the most beautiful and touching shorts in the entire program, all while fitting in perfectly with Plympton’s style. Featuring the voice of Bruce Vilanch, the short centers on an elderly drag queen, silently mourning the loss of his male partner, who agrees to mentor a mute boy. Through writing and art, the two start to forge a communicative bond, centered around the boy’s interest in Whale 52, the loneliest whale. It’s heartfelt and really funny, in a way that contrasts Plympton’s usual sex and violence while complemented by his use of animated surrealism, and it all ends on a beautiful, heartwarming conclusion. Daniel Neiden has been working with Plympton for decades (Daniel was the lead voice in his 1992 feature The Tune), and his effort in the director’s chair has absolutely paid off.
Me, Myself, and Mary turns a Twitter thread about an amusing incident into a freewheeling, anarchic animation that mixes multiple styles to create a hilarious experience. Narrated by Chris O’Dowd, the film is an account by Séamas O’Reilly, who is assigned to serve drinks at his job to not only his boss, but the President of Ireland. One problem: he got his days mixed up and figured he’d be with his buddy doing drugs today, so he’s stuck in a room with one of the country’s most important people while completely high on ketamine. Conveying Séamas’ emotional state with exaggerated imagery and a mixed-media aesthetic, this was one of the funniest shorts of the bunch, and it ends on an absolute gutbuster of a punchline.
You know things are about to get real when the short begins with archival footage of apartheid South Africa, and sure enough, Apart, written by no less than Spike Lee, was the most gut wrenching short of the bunch. A stunningly-animated tearjerker, it tells the story of a white boy, Joel, and a black boy, Themba, who have a forbidden friendship, even more so because Joel’s father is a racist cop. It isn’t long before the two end up separated. However, when tragedy strikes, Themba is willing to make a sacrifice, one that may not stand up to his country’s entrenched racism. The animation in this short is absolutely gorgeous. Most of it is hand-drawn, but was so detailed that I initially thought it was CGI. (Some CGI was used but it blended together perfectly so I can’t actually tell you where it was.) It’s the kind of animated short I hope to see at Tribeca, one that uses the medium to explore shattering themes in often disarming ways. The style is endearing enough that it makes the ending that much more powerful.
Because Today is Saturday follows a mother hoping to relax, but the pressures of motherhood end up driving her to a breaking point, all rendered through a fantastical, scruffy art style I loved. Admittedly, this one’s a little hard to describe in writing, as it’s a very visual short, but it takes full advantage of the animated medium. There are little touches involved that I really admired, like how the mother is the only one colored in in an otherwise black-and-white environment, or how much the film’s story uses her mind as a motif. Her desire for “me time” involves her pulling an entire clone of herself out of her head, a “relaxation spirit” that ultimately must return when her kids need anything, which she also ends up pulling out of her head as well. I also liked how her breakdown was conveyed as her turning into a giant monster.
It’s these kinds of films that make me wonder how anyone at the festival could even think of programming automated works, as the humanity is present in both the diverse art styles, precise animation choices, and the powerful storytelling. Mind you, these aren’t all the shorts. Two shorts, Lost Touch and Verse, were only included in a shorts program separate from the animation screenings. (I will say that I’ve heard very good things about Verse, so keep an eye out for that if possible.) In addition, an animated feature, The Keeper of the Camphor Tree, was also included, but I wasn’t able to get to that. I was, however, able to attend the world premiere of the first two episodes of X-Men ‘97 season two, which was a great experience. Several audience members even dressed up as their favorite characters and, without giving any plot details away, there were multiple moments that made the hundreds of fans in the room burst into rapturous applause.
Finally, I wanted to highlight an animated short film that wasn’t in the competition, but was shown at the festival. A special screening of new films from the New York Times Op-Docs was held, and one of the titles featured was a Sundance short they acquired that was animated. It’s also the best animated short in the entire festival and in fact, it might be one of my favorite animated shorts in recent memory. Living with a Visionary, directed by Stephen P. Neary (The Fungies), adapts the New Yorker article of the same name by John Matthias, with James Cromwell doing the narration. The article is available online, and it’s already a beautiful tearjerker as a written piece, but as a fully realized animated film, it broke me. The article described John’s struggles as his wife began experiencing vivid and fantastical hallucinations due to Parkinson’s. Giants carrying trees and bushes outside. Children playing games in their bedroom. Little people straight out of Gulliver’s Travels crawling around. John initially adapts to their new reality, until the COVID-19 pandemic causes new complications.
The narration is taken straight from the original article, and the language makes it easy to visualize the events or at least create your own image of what Diana is seeing. In Neary’s hands, however, the words are enhanced in beautiful ways through the animated medium. For example, the flowerpot in the hallway becomes “The Flowery Man” to Diana. Whatever creature you’re picturing from that, I don’t think I could’ve done a better job than Neary’s version. Actually seeing what Diana is experiencing adds a much deeper layer of empathy to what was already a heartbreaking story, and I was crying my eyes out by the end of it. The film won the animated shorts competition at Sundance, making it eligible for Oscar consideration. I tend to not be great with early Oscar predictions for short films, but this is such an incredible short that I’m rooting for it regardless.
While it was disheartening to see AI pushed in the animation competition this year, the rest of the shorts more than made up for it by demonstrating why having human touches is so important to the medium. Hopefully, things are different at next year’s fest, but unfortunately, I don’t work for Tribeca Festival, so I can’t change that. Ultimately, these were some of my favorite shorts I’ve seen at the festival since I’ve started going, and I’m glad they got a chance to shine. I hope you get to see many of them soon.
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