by Eric Kohn
The recent announcement about the YouTube Screening Room made major headlines because, well, it's YouTube. Wherever that brand goes, the media follows. Actually, the Screening Room doesn't bring much of anything new to the table -- it's a curated version of YouTube, with four new short films posted every two weeks and the occasional additions of feature-length films -- but the emphasis on cinema, rather than the vaguely defined notion of "online video," helps bring a sense of respect for creative accomplishments to the world's preeminent web video site. Even within this domain, however, the quality has a tendency to waver. Having sifted through it all, we provide here a look at three ideal selections.
The Danish Poet (2007)
Writer-direct Torill Kove's endearing 15-minute short film, presented by The National Film Board of Canada, won the 2007 Academy Award for Animated Short. Although simply drawn, utilizing a style reminiscent of children's literature, The Danish Poet maintains a deeply profound outlook. It tells the story of Kaspar, a lyrically minded young man whose creative block leads him on a soul-searching trip to Norway, where he briefly settles into comfortable farm live and falls for a local girl. From there, the film becomes a tragic tale of lost love ("a life lived in the shadows of guilt and regret") and, finally, blessed renewal. Kove's style, which evokes the adorable simplicity of The Little Prince, proved at the time of its Oscar win that 2-D animation still works quite well with the right material. And this was before Disney made a belated decision to return to its roots with the upcoming The Princess and the Frog.
Are You the Favorite Person of Anybody?
A four minute black-and-white shot of opinionated quirkiness, starring the ever-bumbling John C. Reilly, Are You the Favorite Person of Anybody? features the actor as a sort of personality activist, standing on the side of the road addressing pedestrians with the titular question. It's not a Borat-like antic with hidden cameras, however: Each person has a kind of symbolic meaning based around their response. Miranda July, director of the indie hit You and Me and Everyone We Know, wrote the short and pops in to show the hesitant confidence of believing in an affirmative answer to the question. But the best reply comes from the third character: "I don't vote." Favorite Person is presented by Wholphin, which Stream profiled a few weeks back.
I Met the Walrus (2007)
Nominated for an Academy Award in 2008, Josh Raskin's inventive mixture of documentary forms and animation draws from audio of a 1969 conversation between 14-year-old Jerry Levitan and John Lennon. The rock star was hanging out in his hotel room when Levitan snuck in and got him to talk about his activist perspective, which comes to life in Raskin's evocative imagery. The distinctive beats of Lennon's dialogue and their underlying philosophical significance make for an engaging film, especially the visual manifestation of Lennon's argument against violent protests: "If you run around violently, you get smacked."