Animated Films on DVD and online

Edition Bauhaus. Medien-Kunst. Published by Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau, Christian Hiller, Philipp Oswalt, Thomas Tode. DVD 5, 76’. absolut MEDIEN, order number 450.
ISBN/EAN: 978-3-89848-450-3, € 19,90

The DVD features media art and animation films planed or produced in the 1920s at the Bauhaus school. Some of these experiments were never realized, others were not filmed at the time they were performed. In the 1960s and 1970s, some of the artists began to recreate their ideas. The DVD “Medien-Art” is bringing together the most important of these reconstructions. Werner Graeff, student at the Bauhaus in 1922, published the same year two scores for abstract films that he only realised in 1958/59 and 1977: KOMPOSITION I/1922 and KOMPOSITION II/1922. – Also in 1922, Bauhaus student Kurt Schwerdtfeger developed his REFLEKTORISCHE LICHTSPIELE as visual music. After the war, he reconstructed his scores and staged them together with students. In 1966, shortly after Schwerdtfeger passed away, this performance was documented on film. The DVD has only 17 minutes of the original 24 minutes; it leaves aside the explanations given at the beginning of the film. –  Heinrich Brocksieper, a Bauhaus student from 1919 on, turned to photography in the late 1920s and shot some abstract animation home movies. Most of them were destroyed during the war, only three fascinating fragments – FLÄCHEN, PERPELLERISTISCH; ENTE and NÄHERIN – survived. – Kurt Kranz studied at the Bauhaus from 1930 to 1933. In 1972, he filmed some of his paintings and concepts for animation films: ZWANZIG BILDER AUS DEM LEBEN EINER KOMPOSITION, SCHWARZ:WEISS / WEISS:SCHWARZ, DER HEROISCHE PFEIL, LEPORELLO – ENTWURF FÜR EINEN FARBFILM and VARIATIONEN ÜBER EIN GEOMETRISCHES THEMA. – As a bonus, the DVD brings early films by Hans Richter (RHYTHMUS 21, RHYTHMUS 23) as well as Eggeling’s SYMPHONIE DIAGONALE – obviously by mistake, this film is presented here, without an explanation, in a cut-down version of 2 minutes only, made by Hans Richter in the early 1950s. For a detailled discussion of the Richter films please refer to my book on Hans Richter (Berlin 2003). The main advantage of the DVD is the discovery of the abstract animation films of Brocksieper and the bundling of reconstructions of media art and animation. The booklet, in German only, is not discussing neither the aesthetic quality of the reconstructions nor the set of problems related to afterwards creations of never realised films. (Jeanpaul Goergen, 3.8.2009)

Zeitgenossen. Deutscher Animationsfilm der Gegenwart. Berlin: absolut medien, Best. Nr.: 205 (= Geschichte des deutschen Animationsfilms; 5)
ISBN 978-3-89848-205-9, € 19,90
Info: www.absolutmedien.de
   
Selection of fourteen German animation films from the last 20 years, curated by Ulrich Wegenast, head of the Festival of Animated Film in Stuttgart. His selection reflects the diversity of styles in German animation film without being exhaustive. Wegenast has also contributed the 32page-booklet. Unfortunately, there is no English translation of his texts and of the films that rely on German language to be understood. The DVD is produced together with Goethe-Institut, the Federal Republic of Germany’s cultural institution operational worldwide.

Of course, the DVD covers the two German Oscar-winners BALANCE (1989) by the brothers Lauenstein and QUEST (1996) by Tyron Montgomery and Thomas Stellmach.

In DIE BEICHTE / THE CONFESSION (1990, Jochen Kuhn) Erich Honecker confesses his sins to Karol Wojtyla. Finally, both are trying to enter heaven. DIE KREUZUNG / THE CROSSROADS / THE INTERSECTION (1991, Raimund Krumme) is a play with constantly changing perspectives in a very reduced environment. A man who wants to follow his own way has to react to three party members offering him different ways to go. The puppet animations of DER HAHN / THE COCK (1994, Heinrich Sabl) are partly filmed open-air and on location. The story tells episodes from the live and death of a fierce cock and his two hens. CLOCKS (1995) by Kirsten Winter is a painted documentary animation, based on “Clocks” (1993) for tape and orchestra by Elena Kats-Chernin. WIR LEBTEN IM GRAS / WE LIVED IN GRAS (1995) is the first film by Andreas Hykade. He won the International Mercedes Benz Promotion Award at the International Trickfilm-Festival in Stuttgart in 1996 for “its unusual images, which are naive as well as menacing”: A nervous mother gives birth to a child that walks to the end of the world to become a soldier, his father full of prejudices dies of testicular cancer, while a sandman, a tiger and a dandelion live up to their strange dreams. The English translation of the lyrics can be found on the artist’s website. In 1997, Mariola Brillowska animated the music video DER FALSCHE SPIELER / THE WRONG PLAYER: A gay soccer player is fighting for psychosocial sport hygiene in European football, but he switches to American football. In RUBICON (1997), Gil Alkabetz suggests a solution to the well-known riddle: “A wolf, a sheep and a cabbage need to cross the river. How can you bring them across, one by one, without the sheep eating the cabbage, nor the wolf eating the sheep?” This very risky operation is a metaphor for the Arab-Israeli-conflict. FEUERHAUS / FIREHOUSE (1998) by Bärbel Neubauer is visual music in the German tradition of Ruttmann and Fischinger. The puppet-animation DIE TRÖSTERKRISE / COMFORTER’S CRISES (1999) by Daniel Nocke is based on dialogue. In the experimental animation YO LO VI (2003), Hanna Nordholt and Fritz Steingrobe bring alive the work of Spanish painter Francisco de Goya. _grau (2004) reflects on distortions of organic forms, mostly in floating shapes and grey tones. On his website, Robert Seidel explains that his film “is a personal reflection on memories coming up during a car accident, where past events emerge, fuse, erode and finally vanish ethereally … various real sources where distorted, filtered and fitted into a sculptural structure to create not a plain abstract, but a very private snapshot of a whole life within its last seconds.” The computer animated film 458nm depicts the romantic encounter of two mechanic snakes, but sadly the world is cruel…

Some of the animation films on the DVD are also available on other DVDS. Nevertheless, the DVD “Zeitgenossen” – contemporaries–  is a good starting point to get informed on the development of German animation film in the last two decades. (Jeanpaul Goergen, 13.3.2009)

(added 14.3.2009)

Lotte Reiniger. The Fairy Tale Films. Germany 1922-1961. BFI 2008
2 DVD-9 black and white and colour, English, 197' + 18' extra
Cat. no. BFIVD795, £ 19.99
Available online at www.bfi.org.uk/filmstore

This two-disc digi-pac concentrates on the silhouette fairy tale films Lotte Reiniger made in Britain in the 1940’s and 1950’s. In addition, is holds CINDERELLA (ASCHENPUTTEL, 1922), obviously transferred with 25 frames a second, which is to quick for this early animation film and transforms the slow narration into hectic movements. THE DEATH-FEIGNING CHINAMAN (DER SCHEINTOTE CHINESE, 1928) was a short following-up THE ADVENTURES OF PRINCE ACHMED (1926), but without the elaborated backgrounds of the latter. The 22-page booklet has film notes by Christel Strobel, Philip Kemp and Anke Mebold as well as a director biography by Philip Kemp. As a special feature, disc two comprises the documentary THE ART OF LOTTE REINIGER (16') made by John Isaacs in 1970.
Disc One: CINDERELLA (ASCHENPUTTEL, Germany 1922); THE DEATH-FEIGNING CHINAMAN (DER SCHEINTOTE CHINESE, Germany 1928); THE GOLDEN GOOSE (DIE GOLDENE GANS, Germany 1944); ALADDIN AND THE MAGIC LAMP (Great Britain 1954); THE FROG PRINCESS (Great Britain 1954); THE GALLANT LITTLE TAILOR (Great Britain 1954); SLEEPING BEAUTY (Great Britain 1954); SNOW WHITE AND ROSE RED (Great Britain 1954); CINDERELLA (Great Britain 1954); PUSS IN BOOTS (Great Britain 1954)
Disc two: THE MAGIC HORSE (Great Britain 1954); THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE ANT (Great Britain 1954); THE THREE WHISHES (Great Britain 1954); THUMBELINA (Great Britain 1954); CALIPH STORK (Great Britain 1954); HÄNSEL AND GRETEL (Great Britain 1954); JACK AND THE BEANSTALK (Great Britain 1955); THE LITTLE CHIMENY SWEEP (DER KLEINE SCHORNSTEINFEGER, Germany/Great Britain 1934/1956); THE FROG PRINCE (Great Britain 1961).
(added 16.2.2009, Jeanpaul Goergen)

Lotte Reiniger: DOKTOR DOLITTLE & Archivschätze
Berlin: absolut medien 2008, Stummfilm edition Nr. 821, Serie: Die Klassiker von Lotte Reiniger
DVD 5 + DVD 9, codefree, 133 + 218 minutes, PAL, German, partly English
Release date: 31. October 2008
ISBN: 978-3-89848-821-1, EUR 29,90
Information: http://absolutmedien.de/main.php?view=film&id=1184

This double DVD is the last one of the edition devoted by absolut MEDIEN to Lotte Reiniger. Anke Mebold from Deutsches Filmmuseum in Frankfort curated the edition. She did a pioneer research work to get hold of as many as possible Reiniger films. Often, she was able to find more than one version of a film. The exhaustive booklet (in German only) discusses the different prints and versions in detail.
DOKTOR DOLITTLE UND SEINE TIERE (1928) for example premiered first as a silent film, than released in 1931 as a sound film in Germany and in Great Britain. In 1933, Kinagfa rereleased it as a silent 16mm rental film for schools and private use. In the same year, it was edited in shorter silent versions on ozaphane film for children’s cinema. Finally, in 1970, the German Television broadcasted a version without captions and with a new musical score. It is a major achievement of the Reiniger edition that films are not considered as being unique, but that each historic version has to be considered as an original. Therefore, the DVDs offers some of the Reiniger films in different versions. DOKTOR DOLITTLE UND SEINE TIERE/THE ADVENTURES OF DOCTOR DOLITTLE for example is presented in the German as well as in the English sound version from 1931 and in the television version from 1970.
Anke Mebold, Christel Strobel, Thomas Worschech and Wiltrud Hembus (as the authors of the DVD) have also been able to locate Lotte Reinigers first silhouette film, DAS ORNAMENT DES VERLIEBTEN HERZENS, premiered in 1919. George Eastman House, Rochester, New York, restored it in colour. Reinigers first film already shows her entire mastery, not only in the shaping of the silhouettes, but also in the animation technique required for this genre.
DAS GEHEIMNIS DER MARQUISE (1922) is a short commercial for the trademark Nivea, a skin protecting cream and soap. DIE BARCAROLE (1924) promotes Mauxion chocolate candies. Lotte Reiniger did both films in association with Julius Pinschewer, who also had engaged Walter Ruttmann, among others, to do innovative und outstanding advertising films.
DORNRÖSCHEN (1922) is presented in the only surviving Danish version, probably the Danish version of the 16mm-Kinagfa release from 1931, although the typical Kinagfa-layout of the captions is missing here.
GROTESKEN IM SCHNEE (1928) is a collaborative work by Alex Strasser, active in the German film amateur movement, and Lotte Reiniger. Strasser filmed typical winter sport activities, while Lotte Reiniger comments on the documentary footage with funny silhouette figures. The DVD presents this film in the 16mm-realease by Kinagfa from 1931.
Further more, the DVDs features the advertising films Reiniger made for the General Post Office: THE TOCHER (1937/38), THE HPO (1938), CHRISTMAS IN COMING (1949/51), HERE AND THERE (1949) and NOT WITHOUT LICENCE (1949). The Ministry of Health commissioned MARY’S BIRTHDAY in 1950/51.
While in Canada, Lotte Reiniger made AUCASSIN AND NICOLETTE (1974/75) for the National Film Board. THE ROSE AND THE RING (1978/79) is Lotte Reinigers last major work. Her very last film, the short DIE VIER JAHRESZEITEN, premiered in August 1981, a few weeks after Lotte Reiniger had passed away on June 19, 1981. –
The Bonus-DVD brings two short fragments, made in London in the early 1960’s for TV and theatre, discovered in the Reiniger estate in Tübingen: a volcano mutes to a chimera, and a bulk of funny little rats dance and play while nibbling around. A 16mm colour film shows Lotte Reiniger and friends performing the shadow play FATHER CHRISTMAS, in 1978.
In addition, we can see the Lotte Reinigers short shadow play LE PONT CASSÉ from LA MARSEILLAISE (FR 1937/38) by Jean Renoir. In 1950, Lotte Reiniger did also some puppet animation for the ballet film THE DANCING FLEECE, a promotional film on wool, sponsored by the National Wool Textile Export Corporation.
The bonus material further includes two films erroneously attributed to Lotte Reiniger: DE VERLIEFDE APOTHEKER (archive title) is a live action shadow film, probably from the early 1920s, by Ludwig von Wich, a Munich based artist specialized in this short living genre. The second one – KALIF STORCH (1923) – is a wonderful silhouette film by Ewald Mathias Schumacher, an artist still do discover. The DVD brings a Danish version of a 16mm reduction print in black and white, distributed in 1933 by Agfa under the label Kinagfa.

DVD 1:
DOKTOR DOLITTLE UND SEINE TIERE (1928)
DIE JAGD NACH DEM GLÜCK (1930)
DAS ORNAMENT DES VERLIEBTEN HERZENS (1919)
DAS GEHEIMNIS DER MARQUISE (1922)
DORNRÖSCHEN (1922)
DIE BARCAROLE (1924)
GROTESKEN IM SCHNEE (1928)
THE TOCHER. A FILM BALLET (UK 1937/38)
THE HPO (UK 1938)
CHRISTMAS IN COMING (UK 1949/51) - available also at BFIfilms on YouTube
HERE AND THERE (UK 1949)
NOT WITHOUT LICENCE (UK 1949)
MARY’S BIRTHDAY (UK 1950/51) - available also at BFIfilms on YouTube
AUCASSIN AND NICOLETTE (CA 1974/75)
THE ROSE AND THE RING (CA 1978/79)
DIE VIER JAHRESZEITEN (BRD 1980/81)

DVD 2 (BONUS):
LA CHIMAERA (UK 1960)
PIER PIPER (UK 1960)
FATHER CHRISTMAS (UK 1969/BRD 1978)
Lotte Reiniger as collaborator:
LE PONT CASSÉ in LA MARSEILLAISE (FR 1937/38, D: Jean Renoir)
THE DANCING FLEECE (UK 1950/51)
Films erroneously attributed to Lotte Reiniger:
DE VERLIEFDE APOTHEKER (archive title)
KALIF STORCH (1923, D: Ewald Mathias Schumacher)

More information on Lotte Reiniger and the edition project http://www.lottereiniger.de/
(Jeanpaul Goergen, added January 31, 2009)

Lotte Reiniger: MUSIK UND ZAUBEREIEN [Music and magic]
Berlin: absolutMedien 2007, Stummfilm edition Nr. 785, Serie: Die Klassiker von Lotte Reiniger
2 DVD 5, codefree, 234 minutes, PAL, German, partly English
Release date: March 2007
ISBN: 978-3-89848-785-6, EUR 29,90
Information: http://absolutmedien.de/main.php?view=film&id=1131&list=medien&list_item=2

This double DVD is already the third edition devoted by absolutMEDIEN to Lotte Reiniger; a fourth one is actually in production. It brings 12 films made by Lotte Reiniger between 1930 and 1974 as well as three different versions of a documentary on the art of Lotte Reiniger, directed by John Isaacs and Louis Hagen in 1964/65 and reissued in longer versions in 1971.
DVD 1 assembles the short films along musical scores and subjects Lotte Reiniger did in Germany between 1930 and 1935. For the first time, all these masterpieces are documented here in the best quality actually possible. Two films are to be seen in the original German version as well as in English versions, with interesting differences discussed in depth in the booklet. DVD 1 has also the animated documentary DAS ROLLENDE RAD on the invention of the wheel and transportation systems from the beginning of mankind to the new freeways of the Reich built under the propagandistic patronage of Adolf Hitler.
The second DVD for the first time ever discovers the colour silhouette films Lotte Reiniger animated together with Carl Koch while living in England. Here again, we can compare English and German versions of selected films. HELEN LA BELLE even comes with a fragment of four minutes from another print to illustrate how the colours faded away over the years.
Along with the DVD comes a booklet (27 pages, in German only) with detailed information on each print, especially on the archival situation and the copies used for the DVD edition. Two censorship cards with the complete film commentary are reproduced in facsimile. This is extremely helpful especially for DAS ROLLENDE RAD, of which the final scenes are missing. probably cut off when the film was reissued in 1953 in Germany. The booklet also reproduces an article from the trade-press, dated 1932, which lists all the 20 musical themes used by Reiniger for her short film HARLEKIN. Last but not least, the booklet reprints a hitherto unknown article written by Reiniger in 1931 on the production of one of here most famous films, ZEHN MINUTEN MOZART. Unfortunatelly, the problem of the early sound fim ratio (1:1.19) is not discussed. It seems that at least ZEHN MINUTEN MOZART is preserved only in prints cutting down the early sound film aspect ratio to the academy format (1:1,37).

DVD 1:
ZEHN MINUTEN MOZART (1930)
HARLEKIN (1932)
CARMEN (1933)
DAS ROLLENDE RAD (1934, German commentary)
DAS GESTOHLENE HERZ (1934) + THE STOLEN HEART (1934, re-release of DAS GESTOHLENE HERZ)
DER KLEINE SCHORSTEINFEGER (1934) + THE LITTLE CHIMNEY SWEEP (1953, re-release of DER KLEINE SCHORSTEINFEGER)
PAPAGENO (1935)
GALATHEA (1935)

DVD 2 features silhouette colour films all made in Great Britain:
STERN VON BETHLEHEM (1956, German version) + THE STAR OF BETHLEHEM (1956, English version)
HELEN LA BELLE (1957) + Fragment of a second print, to illustrate the fading of the colours
A NIGHT IN A HAREM (1958)
DER VERLORENE SOHN (1974, German version) + THE LOST SON (1974, English version), a shadow play.
DVD 2 bonus:
LOTTE REINIGERS KUNST (Great Britain, c. 1964/65, German version)
EIN SCHERENSCHNITTFILM ENTSTEHT. LOTTE REINIGER BEI DER ARBEIT (Great Britain, 1971, German version)
THE ART OF LOTTE REINIGERT (Great Britain, c. 1971, English version)

More information on Lotte Reiniger and the edition project http://www.lottereiniger.de/

(Jeanpaul Goergen, added April 15, 2007)

BEST OF ANIMATION 1. Die besten Filme des 13. Internationalen Trickfilm-Festivals 2006 [The best films of the International Festival of Animated Film 2006].
Ed. By Ulrich Wegenast and Dittmar Lumpp.
Absolut MEDIEN Nr. 835
DVD 5 codefree, PAL, 4:3, Dolby Stereo, with booklet, EUR 19,90
Info: http://absolutmedien.de/film-1168

The DVD brings the winners of the Festival of Animated Film in Stuttgart, along with animation films nominated for an Academy Award as well as favorites of the audience. In other words, the film selection is a little bit arbitrary, which in itself is not a bad criterion. It would have been helpful to specify which films were prizewinners at Stuttgart and which ones were chosen by the Festival audience. Unfortunately, the German productions KEIN PLATZ FÜR GEROLD and KERNSEIF, which are strongly based on dialogue, have no English subtitles. The booklet (in German only) has a two pages description of the selected films by Ulrich Wegenast, director of Stuttgart Festival, as well as short information on the selected films:
1) GOPHER BROKE (USA 2004, D: Jeff Fowler, 4'18")
2) KUTOJA (THE LAST KNIT, Finland 2005, D: Laura Neuvonen, 7')
3) MORIR DE AMOR (Germany 2004, D: Gil Alkabetz, 12'40")
A lot of information here: http://morir-de-amor.com/MDA_Information.html (in English)
4) KEIN PLATZ FÜR GEROLD (Germany 2005, D: Daniel Nocke, 4')

5) HISTÓRIA TRÁGICA COM FINAL FELIZ (TRAGIC STORY WITH HAPPY ENDING, Portugal, France, Canada 2005, D: Regina Pessoa, 7', English version with German subtitles)
6) GUARD DOG (USA 2004, D: Bill Plympton, 5')
7) KERNSEIF (Germany 2005, D: Alexander Kiesl, Sebastian Stolle, 3'30")
More info here: http://www.german-films.de/app/filmarchive/film_view.php?film_id=1318 (in English)
8) JAM SESSION (Germany, Poland 2005, D: Izabela Plucinska, 9'30", Polish version with English subtitles)

9) EGO SUM ALPHA ET OMEGA (Germany 2005, D: Jan-Peter Meier, 7'14")
Detailed information (storyboards, galery, film) here: http://www.creaturepark.net/
10) OVERTIME (France 2004, D: Outy Atlan, Damien Ferrié, Thibault Berland, 4'55")
Detailed credits on the German films on the DVD can be found at http://www.filmportal.de (also in English), the central gateway to information on German films.

(Jeanpaul Goergen, added March 31, 2007)