The Classical Animated Documentary and Its Contemporary Evolution

329 Pages·6.873 MB·English

by  Cristina Formenti

The Classical
Animated
Documentary and
Its Contemporary
Evolution

The Classical
Animated
Documentary and
Its Contemporary
Evolution
Cristina Formenti
BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC
Bloomsbury Publishing Inc
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BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC and the Diana logo are trademarks of
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First published in the United States of America 2022
Copyright © Cristina Formenti, 2022
For legal purposes the Acknowledgments on p. x constitute an extension
of this copyright page.
Cover design: Eleanor Rose
Cover image: A still from Fresh Laid Plans (1951), Dir. George Gordon,
John Sutherland Productions
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Formenti, Cristina, author.
Title: The classical animated documentary and its contemporary evolution /
by Cristina Formenti.
Description: New York, NY: Bloomsbury Academic, 2022. | Includes bibliographical
references and index. | Summary: “Addresses the evolutions undergone by the animated
documentary throughout the decades, in order to re-position it within a broader historical
and theoretical context”–Provided by publisher.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021048049 (print) | LCCN 2021048050 (ebook) | ISBN 9781501346460
(hardback) | ISBN 9781501346484 (epub) | ISBN 9781501346477 (pdf)
Subjects: LCSH: Documentary films–History and criticism. | Animated films–
History and criticism.
Classification: LCC PN1995.9.D6 F686 2022 (print) | LCC PN1995.9.D6 (ebook) |
DDC 791.43/3409–dc23/eng/20220112
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021048049
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021048050
ISBN: HB: 978-1-5013-4646-0
ePDF: 978-1-5013-4647-7
ebook: 978-1-5013-4648-4
Typeset by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India
Printed and bound in the United States of America
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CONTENTS
Figures vii
Acknowledgments x
Abbreviations xii
Introduction 1
PART I Theoretical and Historical Issues 11
1 Reality’s Two Animated Faces 13
2 The Sincerest Form of Docudrama 34
3 A New Periodization for an Old Form 49
PART II The Rise and Affirmation of an
Audiovisual Form 75
4 The Age of the Origins, 1909–39 77
5 The Classical Age, 1940–85 94
6 The United States 123
7 Great Britain 162
8 Canada 185
9 Italy 203
vi CONTENTS
PART III The Contemporary Production, 1986 and
Beyond 225
10 Private Truths and Inner Realities 227
11 The Persistence of the Classical Animated
Documentary 246
Toward a Post-Animated Documentary Age? 259
References 266
Index 301
FIGURES
1.1 Blood cells as represented in Blood Transfusion 18
1.2 Blood cells as represented in Defense against Invasion 18
1.3 Frame from The Battle of the North Sea offering a legend of the
symbols employed in the film 19
1.4 A shot from “The Dance of the Lemons” scene in Waiting for
Superman 20
1.5 An example of the data visualization-driven animation from
Waiting for Superman 21
1.6 An example of the employment of the pointer stick from How the
Telephone Talks 26
1.7 Giordano Bruno flying through the Cosmos in Cosmos—A
Spacetime Odyssey 29
2.1 A shot of a recorder from Irinka & Sandrinka 38
3.1 In Look Who’s Driving, Charlie’s thoughts are made visible using a
comic book-like approach 68
3.2 In Man Alive!, the worries of Ed Parmelee are visualized through
thought bubbles 68
3.3 One of the strips created using frames from UPA’s Look Who’s
Driving and published in the newspaper The San Saba News and
Star 69
4.1 A shot of the fly too cute for being envisioned as an enemy that
stars in The Fly 82
4.2 In Diseases Spread’s coda, the personification of disease acts in
front of a map of Japan 84
4.3 The personified gasoline drop protagonist of Down the Gasoline
Trail 90
4.4 A frame from Down the Gasoline Trail in which Chevrolet’s logo is
well visible 91
5.1 In The Traitor Within, the cells forming our body are represented as
assembly line workers in coveralls 102
5.2 In Magic Lab, pepsin is portrayed as a worker involved in
maneuvering a crane 103
5.3 The everyman protagonist of A Great Problem 104
5.4 A red blood cell as personified in Blood 116
viii FIGURES
6.1 An advertisement of John Sutherland Productions that well
synthetizes the studio’s tendency to adapt its “style” to the needs of
the client 146
6.2 The personification of a fuel oil molecule in Gasoline’s Amazing
Molecules 146
6.3 A shot revealing how the shape of Gasoline’s Amazing Molecules’
personified fuel oil molecule is devised from its habitual scientific
graphic visualization 147
6.4 The personification of the atom in A Is for Atom 147
6.5 Air, fuel, and ignition as portrayed in The ABC of Internal
Combustion Engines and its “sequels” 148
6.6 An example of brand placement in the animated visuals of Good
Wrinkles 150
6.7 Planet Earth as represented in Food Will Win the War 155
6.8 Sleepy yawning while working in The Winged Scourge 156
7.1 A shot of a Bank Giro Credit paper slip by Barclays from
The Curious History of Money 170
7.2 A frame from Pan-tele-tron wherein there are some cameras with
the Philips logo 170
7.3 A shot from Refining wherein the animated voice-of-authority is
inserted in a live-action background 176
7.4 A military motor vehicle moving away from a landscape devastated
by the conflict in The Moving Spirit 182
7.5 The military motor vehicle transformed into an automobile for
civilian use after entering a landscape wherein peace has been
restored in The Moving Spirit 183
8.1 A frame from Teeth Are to Keep showing a piece of cutlery next to
the heads of Roger and his family members 191
8.2 A frame from Teeth Are to Keep showing a toothbrush next to the
heads of Roger and his family members 192
8.3 A sun shining over the sea as represented in Energy and Matter
employing a childlike graphic style 195
8.4 The school of fishes that stands for its category in Fish Spoilage
Control 196
8.5 The army of spoilage bacteria from Fish Spoilage Control 197
8.6 The faceless and nameless animated human protagonist characters
of Population Expansion 197
9.1 The Koch bacilli as depicted in Public Threat n. 1 206
9.2 Nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and calcium as represented in
How to Feed Plants 211
9.3 Nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and calcium as represented in
Fertilizers 211
9.4 In Baby Story, Bozzetto represents the ovum as a prosperous
Rapunzel-like queen trapped in an egg 213
FIGURES ix
9.5 Two sketched couples dressed in clothes from the eighteenth
century that are shown in the act of dancing in a scene of Adventure
in the Cell 218
9.6 The pyramidal cells responsible for our voluntary movements as
represented in Anatomy of Motion 219
9.7 The representation of the human brain in Hemo the
Magnificent 219
10.1 In Ryan, red spikes come out of Larkin’s head when he talks about
how limiting lack of money can be 230
10.2 The animated figure deprived of elements that could connote it
as female or male associated with the testimonials of Bill, Samuel,
Steve, and Camille in Sleepless 243