UC lecturer launches book at leading French animation festival
Published by Communications and Development
6 November 2007
Being a part of the world’s foremost animation film festival was an exhilarating experience for Dr Terence Dobson (Theatre and Film Studies).
Dr Dobson, who teaches animated film at UC, was asked to attend the Annecy Animation Festival, in France, to launch his new publication, The Film Work of Norman McLaren.
The book is the first substantial treatment of Norman McLaren, one of the20th century’s leading film makers with more than 50 films to his name.
“Norman McLaren was a major innovator in film. When starting a new film he preferred to use a fresh technique; finding this a stimulating and satisfying way of working. As it also resulted in McLaren’s invention of numerous never-before-seen techniques, the film maker’s approach is of immense import to film generally,” said Dr Dobson.
“McLaren’s open-ended definition of animation allowed him to animate anything in any way. He defined animation not as the art of drawings that move but rather the art of movement that is drawn. Thus he used all manner of drawing techniques, and eventually manipulated things other than drawings.
“For example, in 1952, McLaren pioneered the animation of live people in his film, Neighbours. The neighbours slide, fly and glide in this funny yet devastating anti-war parable which ironically, considering McCarthyism was then at its height, earned McLaren an Oscar.
“Despite his many awards and honours, the very scope of McLaren’s work together with the varied purposes of his films has meant that his films appeared incongruent. There is, for example, the shocking violence of Neighbours and the gentle whimsy of Hen Hop; the didacticism of Canon and the scintillating abstract energy of Begone Dull Care; the functionalism of Book Bargain and the sublime beauty of Pas de deux."
Dr Dobson said McLaren’s legacy was stronger than ever. While at Annecy, Dr Dobson met with National Film Board of Canada director Marc Bertrand who last year released a multi-disc DVD Master’s Edition on McLaren. Film work of McLaren’s was also screened during the Annecy festival and its enthusiastic and appreciative reception confirmed for Dr Dobson that McLaren’s films have lost none of their power to move people.
McLaren’s work will figure strongly in Dr Dobson’s summer semester course ‘Animated Film’.
Dr Dobson’s book is extensively illustrated by contemporary photographs and also by film grabs from McLaren’s works, most of which are in colour. It has been published by John Libbey Publishing (UK), the world’s leading publisher of animation books, whose North American distributor is Indiana University Press.
* The Film Work of Norman McLaren by Terence Dobson, published by John Libbey, Hardback, ISBN 0 86196 656 2.
For further information please contact:
Jeanette Colman
Communications Manager
University of Canterbury
Ph (03) 364 2260
jeanette.colman@canterbury.ac.nz