CFP – Animating History: “Disney Americans” and Other Myths
Animating History: “Disney Americans” and Other Myths Area of multiple panels for the Film & History Conference on “Film & Myth” September 26-30, 2012 Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA http://www.filmandhistory.org Deadline: June 1, 2012 We live in a world made of myths, legends, and histories that are communicated, and often, conflated, by our entertainment media. For many [...]
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows Highlight: The Tale of the Three Brothers
This last Saturday I went with my family to the theater to see the latest installment in the Harry Potter franchise, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows – Part 1. It may come as a surprise to regular readers of this blog who are familiar with my passion for the fantastic, but I have never [...]
Computer Animated Zombie Apocalypse in A.D.
What do you get when Pixar-style animation meets zombie apocalypse? A great looking piece of computer animation like A.D. This is a trailer for a promised longer film by creator Haylor Garcia. An interview with those who are working on this film can be found here at the Zombie Info website. If the completed film [...]
Disney’s The Princess and the Frog: Cartoon Fantasy and Social Reflection
I haven’t seen Walt Disney’s The Princess and the Frog movie yet, but living in a neighborhood with young families many of them have, and they seem to have enjoyed it. The television advertisements for the film make me a little wary since it is supposedly the best Disney cartoon since The Lion King. But [...]
“Midnight Dance” Animation: An Interpretation of Danse Macabre
As readers are aware, this blog is devoted to the exploration and enjoyment of various facets of the fantastic in pop culture. Most of the time I pursue in-depth exploration, and through this receive a level of enjoyment. Hopefully my readers do to0. But with this post analysis steps aside in order to enjoy a great [...]
Disney Pixar’s UP: Art’s Tension with Profit Potential
The business section of today’s The New York Times includes an article of interest to TheoFantastique. The story by Brooks Barnes is titled “Pixar’s Art Leaves Profit Watchers Edgy,” and it describes an unfortunate situation. As the article notes, Pixar Animation has [...]
Monsters vs. Aliens: DreamWorks Hits a Home Run
Yesterday my family forced me to take a much-needed half-day off, and a part of my relaxation involved taking in a showing of Monster vs. Aliens. I must admit that when I saw the commercials for the film they looked promising but I had my doubts about the ability of the film to live up to [...]
DEAD SPACE: DOWNFALL Animated Exploration of Sci Fi/Horror and Gaming
Last weekend a new title on the shelves of the DVD section at Target caught my eye and quickly became a part of my animation collection. The film is titled DEAD SPACE: DOWNFALL, and it is a feature-length prequel to the EA Game DEAD SPACE. The subject matter, violence, and gore of this film make [...]
Van Norris: Surrealism in American Animation
A number of research sources have provided a variety of things to think about in my exploration of deeper levels to the fantastic. One thought provoking source was David Skal’s book The Monster Show: A Cultural History of Horror (Faber & Faber, 2001) where, among other things, he argued for a connection between horror [...]
WALL-E: Moving Visual Storytelling, Laughs, and Subtle Social Commentary
It had been some time since my family and I took in a movie at the theater. Normally we keep our eye out for advertisements of upcoming films, and then once a movie is released to DVD we make a trip to the nearest Redbox DVD rental location and for $1 we have a good [...]
