I saw WIZARDS when it came out and haven't seen it since. I have a VHS copy of it waiting to be viewed for this challenge. It's either that or STREETFIGHT (aka COONSKIN) to fill in Bakshi on the checklist. STREETFIGHT is also rated R, perhaps the only animation I have with that rating.

I'd also urge you to watch some films to commemorate the great anime director, Satoshi Kon, who just died at the age of 46. He wrote a segment of Katsuhiro Otomo's MEMORIES and he directed the theatrical anime films, PERFECT BLUE, MILLENNIUM ACTRESS, TOKYO GODFATHERS and PAPRIKA, as well as the TV series, "Paranoia Agent."

Does anyone know if I can I stream any of these from Netflix? I've never cared for anime, but might take a gander in the spirit of this challenge.

A new friend has raved about Paprika, I'll check it out, maybe tonight.

for new friends

I know you can't for the first two.

I finally saw Spirited Away after starting it two other times and getting called away.

A little disappointing because I was hoping for more plot and less character vignettes. Still looks great and I'm glad I saw it tho.

I should have taped tonight's Reds/Giants game and re-watched it in October for the Horror Challenge... Anyway, I decided to finally watch some of the free content I've got from iTunes that has gone unwatched.

I watched the first episode of Family Guy (which I'd seen on TV several times before), the first two episodes of Spaceballs: The Animated Series (which I'd never seen, but turned out to be an abridged adaptation of the film, which I had seen) and the first episode of SpongeBob SquarePants (which, believe it or not, was my first ever viewing of that series).

Wow, was it hard to believe both Family Guy and SpongeBob began in 1999! I don't think the Family Guy episode has aged well, but SpongeBob holds up 11 years later. The animation on Spaceballs was great, but of course it's hard to evaluate the series based solely on an adaptation of the movie; I'd like to see the rest of the all-new material (though I hear the series was short-lived for a reason).

I watched Waltz With Bashir the other day and Finished Persepolis not too long ago and I completely agree with what you said. Waltz With Bashir was thoroughly unenjoyable. I found it to be self-indulgent and a real chore to sit through. At the end of the movie I didn't feel as though anything had been accomplished or that it stood for anything; it felt as though the filmmaker and his friends were just trying to ease their conscious. I didn't even really enjoy the animation either, so as far as I'm concerned it had nothing going for it.

Persepolis, on the other hand, was inspired. I loved every moment of it. It had a depth and a purpose that Waltz With Bashir could only hope to aspire to. I watched the movie and felt for the characters, sympathized with their struggles, and respected what I was watching. This is a great example of just how far animation has come and how much it can accomplish. It highlighted something real and ongoing and shed light on things that we only hear about briefly in the news. It had humour and heart, but sadness and despair. As much as I love Pixar, I think this probably should have won the Academy Award instead of Ratatouille (and I'm a huge Pixar fanboy, so that's saying something). I enjoyed it so much that I think I'm going to order the graphic novels and read them as well.

Worked out well that I watched Waltz With Bashir for my least favourite genre (documentary) and couldn't stand it, but paired Persepolis up with Grave Of The Fireflies for my foreign language entries and enjoyed both very much.

If you enjoyed the film, you should really read the source material. The film truncated a lot (as is standard with an adaptation), and I felt the pace of the film glossed over a lot of the poignancy of the printed story. Of course, I could linger as I saw fit while reading; the film kept playing. I agree entirely with your assessment, though: Marjane Satrapi did an astounding job finding the basic humanity in events entirely too often characterized in de-humanized terms.

both films (Waltz and Persepolis) also demonstrate that traditional cel animation is still a viable animation art form, people (and studios) like to think that CGI is the future, it's these films that beautifully illustrate and refute that claim.

I would add Disney's Princess and the Frog; it's gorgeous. The big thing that I think CGI offers is the ability to tinker and edit in a way not afforded in hand drawn animation. You have to spend a lot more time to experiment with hand drawn work to see what different angles, etc. look like whereas the computer models can be manipulated in 3D at will.

I agree wholeheartedly with The Princess & The Frog. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed the movie and it really was a return to form for Disney as far as I'm concerned. I'd also throw the animated portions of Enchanted in there as well.

Gotta say I'm officially a Ralph Bakshi fan now. Up until this challenge I only knew him as the guy responsible for Fritz the Cat and occasionally mentioned on some Simpsons commentaries. But after seeing Fire and Ice, Wizards and American Pop, I've really come to enjoy his very distinct style of animation.

And being such a huge Simpsons fan, I was amazed to find out that a) Comic Book Guy may have been inspired by him and b) Bakshi himself feels Matt Groening essentially stole the idea of Homer Simpson from the Angelo Corleone character:



http://www.ralphbakshi.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=573

"I met Groening once at a lecture - He was very complimentary. He just took the character - he didn't ask. Nor would I have given him the permission."

I'm assuming he's referring more to the mannerisms than the appearance. Guess I'll judge for myself once Heavy Traffic arrives from Netflix.

I've only seen two Bakshi films; Cool World and Wizards. The former seemed to me a weak attempt at a more sexual Who Framed Roger Rabbit that rested more on its premise than its story, and I've already given my thoughts on Wizards. I did admire the animation work on it, even though the story left me somewhat cold. I'll continue exploring his filmography, though.

As for The Simpsons, I was never a fan so I can't comment or even speculate on any issues of character theft.

So I just finished watching Fritz The Cat for the first time. Can't say that I'm too awful impressed, at least in the final product. I think it would have made for a lot better movie without the forced and over-the-top sexuality and gross-out gags. I sort of liked the premise behind the character and the social commentary, but this is a prime example of where less is more. It's as though Bakshi intentionally threw in as much as possible to try and offend people's sensibilities to compensate for his poor story-telling ability. Because really, there's a great story that he could tell here, but he totally dropped the ball and instead went for the shock factor (I mean, what was the point of the dog beating/killing the chickens?). I guess it succeeded, seeing as how successful the movie was, but it's success i undeserved in my opinion because Bakshi forsook plot in the name of offensiveness.

There are so many missed opportunities that could have made this more than just an offensive piece of shock animation. This was supposed to be a movie about a college student finding themselves and their place in the world, but it wasn't even remotely successful in conveying that. There were brief moments of promise (the three female animals in the beginning trying to convince the crow how much they understood him, Fritz having his epiphany before the dynamite exploding, and the general idea of Fritz bouncing around from social group to social group), but they were so few and far between that the movie remains utterly pointless in the end.

That being said, the movie did have a few things I enjoyed. I actually sort of dug the animation style. I especially loved the background designs, they were artfully done and really were a pleasure to look at. If there was one thing that redeemed this terrible movie for me, it was the background designs and Bakshi deserves praise for that element of the movie. I also liked the more abstract transitional scenes, where things were set against a black background as well and found them especially inventive. The actual character designs were interesting, but nothing really too special. I found the characters a little too rough, but I guess it sort of did fit the tone of the movie.

The portrayal of the police as pigs was lame and uninspired. It was such an obvious thing to do that it felt a cheap cliche relied upon by Bakshi for some cheap laughs. The portrayal of African Americans as crows took took what Disney did and made it more offensive and with worse animation; not to mention the fact that the portrayals and characterizations were ridiculously stereotypical.

I did like Skip Hinnant's voice work as Fritz though.

This is a movie I'm glad I watched given its place animation history, but will never watch again. It isn't that I'm offended by it, it's that it's genuinely a bad movie and fails to accomplish what should have been its point.

I watched American Pop the other night. First time in about 15 years. One thing that blew me away was the character's mouth movements. I swear in certain scenes I could read their lips if I had no audio. That's how accurate the animated mouths were.

You should read R. Crumb's comic book. Very different from the movie. And much better, much funnier. I only saw the movie once when it came out and I don't remember liking it much. But I reread the comic sometime in the '90s and enjoyed it.

I watched some more stuff on my iPod last night; the pilot/first episodes of The Cleveland Show (which I think I'd seen on TV); Adventure Time with Finn and Jake (felt overlong, even at 12 minutes); Bakugan (a favorite of my nephew's; did absolutely nothing for me); Ben 10 (liked the animation; story was interesting enough I could watch some more).

From the Origins of Animation collection, I watched Never Again! The Story of a Speeder Cop (about a traffic cop who is overwhelmed by speeders), The Phable of a Busted Romance and The Phable of the Phat Woman (each ostensibly about a moral, but by today's standards quite cynical), and W.S.S. Thriftettes (a minute long commercial, I think, for war bonds? I'm not sure.).

It's fun to go back and forth from the cutting edge animation of today to the primitive efforts of yesteryear. Thanks, Animation Challenge!

Just watched Sleeping Beauty, which my wife picked. Now we're both wide awake and I think we're gonna watch something else. Maybe The Jungle Book.

So I haven't used a wild card yet, and all of the animation has me wanting to watch Enchanted. Since it has extended animation sequences and the entire movie is done in the vein of Disney's Princess Movies, would that be acceptable as a wild card? Figured I'd use it as my "Random Title" if it would count as a wild card since it just sort of popped into my head to watch it recently because of the challenge.

^ I don't think you have to give much justification for a wild card. I'd run with it.

I thought Enchanted was already established as an eligible title? In any event, I'm glad you reminded me of the wild card. My wife and I were watching Sleeping Beauty last night and discovered there was a short film included, Grand Canyon. I began playing it, unaware that it wasn't animated at all; it's all live action nature footage set to "The Grand Canyon Suite."

It was included because, apparently, it was shown before Sleeping Beauty during its original theatrical release. Even though it's not animated, would that be an acceptable use of a wild card?

I'd say yes to both. Enchanted counts as much as Sleeping Beauty, no need to use a wildcard. And that live-action short would be a viable wildcard, given it's history.

On a sad note, did you all see that Japanese anime director Satoshi Kon passed away?

I've already done two of my Wild Cards - though I'm pondering what I should do for my third one - might do a 'making of' DVD supplement.

It is very said, but didn't you acknowledge that discussion in post #303?