SATELLITE EVENTS

a community FilmEdSoc project,
WE CONTROL THE CONTENT

presents: ANIMATION MAGIC!!!

OTTO MESSMER AND FELIX THE CAT (1977)
BEHIND THE SCENES AT WALT DISNEY STUDIOS (1941)
WIZARDS (1977)

Monday 4th of June
Registration: 7.30 - 8.00pm
Screening: 8.00pm
the back room of the Empress Hotel, 714 Nicholson Street (cnr Scotchmer Street), North Fitzroy, Melbourne
contact: splodgeburger [ @ ] yahoo.com

THIS IS A FILM SOCIETY SCREENING OPEN TO MEMBERS
ADMISSION IS RESTRICTED TO MEMBERS FOR THIS PROGRAMME
BUT IF YOU WISH TO BECOME A MEMBER, THE JOINING FEE IS SO LOW, IT MIGHT AS WELL BE FREE!

MEMBERSHIP RATES: Quarterly*:
Generally Socially-Advantaged : $7.00
Generally Socially-Oppressed: $6.00

*annual and half-yearly memberships available on request

If you wish to join on the night, we strongly advise you
to arrive well-prior to the time listed for the screening to commence!

Sign up for the Splodge! email program list – splodgeburger [ @ ] yahoo.com
http://movies.groups.yahoo.com/group/splodgefilms/

We here at MIAF love Splodge!! Splodge! is a decade old institution – if you don’t know about it, you should! Monthly screenings of weird, wild, real and unreal films on the first Monday of the month – all in glorious 16mm. Sir Alan Splodge is a walking encylopedia of all things filmic and his special collection of animated wonders for MIAF month will be a big night out. We seriously recommend dropping into the relaxed environment of the Empress Hotel in North Fitzroy, where you can grab a beer and a damn fine pub meal, sit back and enjoy this collection of absolute filmic treats!

ABOUT THE FILMS...

OTTO MESSMER AND FELIX THE CAT, (1977)

In this documentary, 84-year old Otto Messmer talks about how he worked on Pat Sullivan's famous cartoon character, Felix the Cat, and presents what made the character a megastar rivalling Chaplin in it's day. Includes excerpts from five vintage Messmer cartoons from the 1920s starring Felix.

"Outstanding Achievement," 21st Annual San Francisco International Film Festival 1977.
"A tribute to a neglected figure in the world of animation. . . it brings Felix to life again for a new generation." Film News, Summer 1977.

Prod Co: Phoenix Films. Prod: John Canemaker. Dir: John Canemaker. Wr: John Canemaker. Mus: Ross Care. Phot: Richard W. Adams. Dist: Phoenix Learning Group, Inc., St. Louis, MO. 25 mins. ALC

BEHIND THE SCENES AT WALT DISNEY STUDIOS, (1941)


Humourist, Dorothy Parker associate and 'Algonquin set' regular ROBERT BENCHLEY pays a visit the Disney Studios to sell Unca Walt on the idea of animating the story of THE RELUCTANT DRAGON (1941). While evading an officious young studio guide, BENCHLEY stumbles into various studio activities and departments, including an art class, a sound-effects session, the multi-plane camera studio (at which point he notices the film has switched to Technicolor™), the paint lab, a storyboard session for the "Baby Weems" segment, a movieola screening of the Goofy cartoon HOW TO RIDE A HORSE (1950) and finally catches up with Walt in a screening room just as he's previewing the studio's latest film... THE RELUCTANT DRAGON (1941)!

Prod Co: WALT DISNEY. Prod: WALT DISNEY. Dir: Alfred L. Werker, Hamilton Luske. Phot: Bert Glennon; Winton C. Hock. Ed. Paul Weatherwax. 26 mins. ALC

WIZARDS, (1977)




NAZI WIZARDS, PROSTITUTE FAIRIES AND KUNG FU ELVES
Just for once, I think that - if you've read the above tagline or viewed the trailer - you will have already made up your mind as to whether you will actually want to see this movie, but, let me tell you, it is probably weirder than you could possibly imagine.

10,000,000 years after the Nuclear War, Mankind evolves into two distinct races - those who live in the good lands, where the sunlight comes through ( - it came back after 2,000,000 years) and have evolved into elves, fairies and other good folk, and those who live in the shadow lands, where people still die of radiation, and have changed into trolls, orcs and other nasty creatures.

To a mother in the good lands, a set of twins is born after a storm, both of whom are Wizards - one is good, and the other evil. Naturally, they have a face-off and the good one wins (for the time being), but 3000 years later, the story picks up again with the good twin (Avatar) being an advisor to the President of the good lands and the bad twin (Blackwolf) being ruler of all the evil lands.

Blackwolf begins sending assassins out to kill all the ‘believers in magic’, as he wants technology to rule. After a successful attempt on the President - who Avatar was meant to be guarding - the old good Wizard sets out to stop his evil twin with two companions - a Kung Fu elf and a fairy-in-training who wears a little white bikini for the entire movie - along with a reprogrammed killer droid dubbed Peace - "in the hope that he may bring it".

However, bac in the evil land of Scortch, Blackwolf, in his war against magic, has revealed his secret weapon to help his army defeat the magic users - he has dug up (literally) an old ("fairy"-powered) movie projector, which runs old Nazi propaganda movies (complete with Hitler - TRIUMPH OF THE WILL (1935), actually) to scare the enemy into submission.

This movie is so completely off-the-wall and unexpected - in a really good way - that it is hard to describe it properly. It certainly has better gags than Peter Jackson's LORD OF THE RINGS, and the charming song ONLY TIME WILL TELL, sung by JESSE WELLES (Elinore), is also worthy of special mention.

I would probably recommend that you were not sober when watching this film, as it can be a challenge to comprehend at the best of times ( - but you'll have more fun too, if you just relax and give in to it. Anyway, that's the way I first saw it.) It will probably make it easier to appreciate some of the film techniques employed too, which are not all animation, some of them being nightmarish rotoscoped overlays of the same soldiers, over and over again: soldiers in Nazi uniform, with horns growing out of their helmets, knights in armour ( - actually excerpts from Sergei Eisenstein's ALEKSANDR NEVSKIY (1938), and Zulu tribesmen, from the film ZULU (1964)! WIZARDS also features rotoscoped footage traced from EL CID (1961), BATTLE OF THE BULGE (1965), and "PATTON (1970). It's always fun to watch out for that kind of stuff.

Prod Co: Bakshi Productions. Prod: RALPH BAKSHI. Dir: RALPH BAKSHI. Wr: RALPH BAKSHI. Mus: ANDREW BELLING. Phot: Ted C. Bemiller. Ed:Donald W. Ernst. Cast: Jim Connell (The President), Steve Gravers (Blackwolf), Angelo Grisanti (Frog), MARK HAMILL (Sean - voice)Adolf Hitler - archive footage (himself), Peter Hobbs (General), Bob Holt (Avatar), David Proval (Peace), RICHARD ROMANUS (Weehawk), Tina Romanus, as Tina Bowman (Prostitute), Barbara Sloane (Fairy), Christopher Tayback (Peewhittle), Susan Tyrrell (Narrator, var. voices), JESSE WELLES (Elinore), Hyman Wien (Priest). 81 mins. RM

SPLODGE! NOTES:
1st. Mon. in JUNE (04/06/07)
splodgeburger [ @ ] yahoo.com

ON THE FIRST MONDAY OF EVERY MONTH
(except January's!)

Unusual films of discernment, still presented in convivial surroundings!

ALL PRESENTED ON
GROOVY 16 MILLIMETRE FILM!

Minor programme changes may occur due to unforseen circumstances.
Feature runs last; shorts order may vary from listing.

* Acknowledging ACMI Inc. & ScreenSound Australia *