Latest feature Films
BLIND WILLOW, SLEEPING WOMAN
With “Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman”, painter, composer and animator Pierre Földes has ventured to make the very first animated film adaptation of a Murakami story.
Strictly speaking, his screenplay interweaves elements from several short stories by the Japanese writer into an associative overall picture. The focus is on a handful of men and women who lead parallel lives and become paralysed by their own thoughts. Of course, these are not ordinary identification figures. And yet, an earthquake, a runaway cat and a human-like, chatty frog force the protagonists to actively confront each other and – in the case of the men – their inner emptiness. But fortunately, much remains in limbo, and the seriousness is occasionally interspersed with ironic life lessons.
In “Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman”, the effect of Haruki Murakami’s magical realism is more evident than in the live-action adaptations “Burning” and “Drive My Car”. In addition to the appearance of the frog and fluid transitions into surreal worlds of thought, Földes draws on the possibilities animated film has to offer, for example, by surrounding the socially isolated protagonists with transparent figures. The filmmakers have also gone their own way in terms of production technology. In order to plot the dream-like narrative flow in detail, Földes first shot the film with actors in an empty studio and completely edited it. Then the animators copied the poses and replaced all the heads with 3D models, whose faces were subsequently animated classically by hand. The resulting idiosyncratic atmosphere is accentuated by the film’s soundtrack, composed by the director. (Oswald Iten)
Strictly speaking, his screenplay interweaves elements from several short stories by the Japanese writer into an associative overall picture. The focus is on a handful of men and women who lead parallel lives and become paralysed by their own thoughts. Of course, these are not ordinary identification figures. And yet, an earthquake, a runaway cat and a human-like, chatty frog force the protagonists to actively confront each other and – in the case of the men – their inner emptiness. But fortunately, much remains in limbo, and the seriousness is occasionally interspersed with ironic life lessons.
In “Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman”, the effect of Haruki Murakami’s magical realism is more evident than in the live-action adaptations “Burning” and “Drive My Car”. In addition to the appearance of the frog and fluid transitions into surreal worlds of thought, Földes draws on the possibilities animated film has to offer, for example, by surrounding the socially isolated protagonists with transparent figures. The filmmakers have also gone their own way in terms of production technology. In order to plot the dream-like narrative flow in detail, Földes first shot the film with actors in an empty studio and completely edited it. Then the animators copied the poses and replaced all the heads with 3D models, whose faces were subsequently animated classically by hand. The resulting idiosyncratic atmosphere is accentuated by the film’s soundtrack, composed by the director. (Oswald Iten)
Info
Duration 108'
Country FR/LU/CA/NL, 2022
Appointments & Tickets
Wed 6.9. • 20:45
Cinema Trafo 2
Fri 8.9. • 18:15
Cinema Trafo 1*
Sat 9.9. • 16:00
Cinema Trafo 3*
Artist present