Stop-Motion Animation, or What The Hell Was I Watching As A Kid?!
A few months back, I heard about a really bizarre movie coming out involving toys, stop-motion animation, and subtitles. It was called A Town Called Panic (2009), and once I saw the preview, I nearly lost my shit; if I didn’t go see that movie, I didn’t know what was right in the world. However, seeing as it is foreign and strange, I knew that normal “mainstream” theaters (like the VRC Regal) would not shine the light of day on this strange creature.
Fast-forward about three months to Patterson and 13th, on a normal Thursday afternoon. The sun was shining outside, but I made the choice to leave the sunny lawn in front of the EMU to embark in one of the most bizarre hour and twenty-five minutes of my life. I gave up sunshine for a chance to see A Town Called Panic at the Bijou Theater.
Here’s a loose plotline: Based off of an older kids “TV show” (I say this in quotes because it wasn’t exactly a full show, but rather a group of small clips), A Town Called Panic follows the lives of Cowboy (played by a gumball-machine cowboy figurine), Indian (an Indian figurine) and Horse (a horse figurine) as they live in this insane town. In the movie, Cowboy and Indian decide to build Horse a barbeque for his birthday, but instead of ordering the 50 bricks they need to build it, they accidentally order 50,000,000. Even though the party goes well, the bricks destroy the house and (practically) the rest of town. Horse, pissed about the whole event, gets Cowboy and Indian to rebuild their beloved house only to find that, after they fall asleep every night, weird water creatures are stealing their walls. So the rest of the movie is spent trying to get their walls back from the insane water creatures. Yes, this is the plotline. No, I’m not insane.
Annnnd here’s the preview:
Now I know you’re probably thinking I’m crazy for spending my time to see this movie, but to be completely honest: this was the best movie I’ve seen the whole year! It’s ridiculous, it’s nut-job insane, and it’s fantastic!
But I’ve been thinking… Stop-motion animation is really beginning to turn around again: late last year we had Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), the classic story book retold by indie movie god Wes Anderson, and shows like “Robot Chicken” (on late at night on [adult swim]) are becoming more and more popular.
However, people tend to take this style of animation as a crazy person’s nightmares. And in a way that’s true. I mean, there are COUNTLESS numbers of terrifying claymations that just irk you in a creeptastic way.
When I hear people say this, however, I like to remind them of all the TV shows they enjoyed when they were kids. After all, back in the 90s, stop-motion animation was in practically every popular cartoon!
So, with this, I’d like to count down to my TOP FIVE favorite stop-motion animated kids’ shows! NOW WITH CLIPS!!
