19th Animation Division Critiques

Life Itself is the Asset for a Creator

Rhizome is a work in which small pieces of the ecological system on earth are beautifully described. Most creators' ideas are influenced by culture, philosophy, creatures or their relations, and this work incorporates all of them in the short film. It was highly evaluated that the creatures and objects were drawn using a very sublime analog technique. Programmed algorithm was introduced into scenes where hierarchies of characters and an ecological system formed a balanced harmony between analog and digital. I recommend to watch it on 8K.
The Case of Hana & Alice was interesting because the "pause or atmosphere when people talk" is included in animation by incorporating on-the-spot filming. In addition to the original layout and character descriptions from particular viewpoints, what animators typically not describe (nor had not wished to describe) is done in this work by on-the-spot filming. Other animators should watch this work for future reference.
Yùl and the Snake, akin to The Case of Hana & Alice, is an animated film incorporating on-the-spot filming, and characters in this work are more "deformed" than in The Case of Hana & Alice.
I feel that such fascinating portrayal would not have been realized without the author's outstanding technique and originality as a painter. Moreover, this work is so vivid, it provokes one's physiological reactions and the author's directing ability surpasses others. Typhoon Noruda, which won a New Face Award, would be better if the scenario producer was more actively involved. Any work can be easily askewed if the dynamics are not directed along the essential axis. This work would be much better if the dynamics of movements was made clearer.
As an overall evaluation, dynamism and realism can bring life into the works, although innnovative expression is also good to have in the field of animation. Vivid vitality, as well as harsh sensation and tingling pain that make you want to avert your attention, exist there simultaneously. Such personal experiences and life itself is the greatest asset for a creator yearning for originality, which one can only feel through "one's own skin", and not by just nonchalantly seeing or hearing.

Profile
MORIMOTO Koji
Animation Director
Born in 1959 in Wakayama Prefecture. After serving as an assistant animation director for AKIRA, he directed MEMORIES (EPISODE 1) - MAGNETIC ROSE, EXTRA, Animatrix, Genius Party Beyond - Dimension Bomb #5 and the opening of SHORTPEACE. Genius Party Beyond - Dimension Bomb #5 was screened in the exhibition MOEBIUS-TRANS-FORME at the Foundation Cartier pour l'Art Contemporain in Paris and during the Little Tokyo Design Week in Los Angeles. In 2011, his interactive web commercial Attraction was awarded a Silver Award in the Cyber Division at the Cannes International Creativity Festival. In 2013, he participated as animation director in A Better Tomorrow, which was part of Lexus Short Films, a hybrid multi-media production organized by LEXUS and produced by The Weinstein Company, and which premiered at the Cannes International Film Festival. In that same year, he wrote and directed Sheepman 012, his first work for the stage. In 2014, he created a 15-second teaser for the new album of the internationally acclaimed instrumental post-rock band MONO.