TITLE: "Honey" DIRECTOR: Evan Cagle PRODUCER:Ari
Neubauer PRODUCED BY: Studio Albino STATUS: in production RELEASE DATE: currently unknown - seeking animators LENGTH: ~25 minutes
I like films that surprise me with their originality and
depth. Austin Texas artist Evan Cagle's "Honey"
is a film that looks ready to do that for me.
It's obviously influenced a lot by anime, but without falling
victim to the Anime Curse of artless predictability. At
the same time, it's obviously influenced by classic illustration
and Old Masters without falling into the Pretention Trap.
Set in a time when the Old Ways were giving way to the Age
of Enlightenment, "Honey" mines rich themes of
change, arrogance, simplicity and wisdom, which resonate
strongly in our current times. It is that theme which in
a way describes the current state of animation, and so the
way Cagle has begun making this film, with an emphasis on
hand-drawn animation and backgrounds, but allowing CG where
appropriate, is a perfect complement to the material.
This is not a Western cliché-ridden attempt to imitate
anime by someone who doesn't understand the form, nor is
it a heavy-handed corporate attempt to get in on the Anime
Thing the way so many regrettable pieces of "animation"
have recently been made. This is a single director putting
forth his singular vision in a format that evokes anime
along with many other influences of a more sublime nature.
"Honey" so far appears to be a film with warmth
and class, and I look forward to seeing this one completed.
But there is only so much one man can do, and to Cagles's
credit, he has begun looking for artists to help him realize
this vision. If you can help, or know someone who can, I
encourage you to drop the studio a line. When last I heard,
it was a paying gig, so don't mess around -- get in there
and perhaps you will be part of the creation of something
truly special!
"You
must know the bond between keeper and bee is that of a father
and his child..."
"A
friend described the look of Honey as "Amano's Angel's
Egg meets Edmund Dulac and Arthur Rackham", an assessment
I couldn't be happier with. It goes a long way in describing
my own aesthetic influences, from Japanese illustrators like
Makoto Kobayashi and Yoshitaka Amano, to fairytale princes
Arthur Rackham and Brian Froud to heavy hitters like Albecht
Dürer, Gustav Doré and Edward Burne-Jones. I hope
that somehow these (as well as countless other influences)
can be distilled through my own filter, revealing a new perspective,
a new feeling. In terms of art and design, I think Honey really
illustrates my own unhappiness with the slavish rehashing
of anime tropes many American productions have hurried to
commit, and my unwillingness to allow my admiration of anime
to dictate any more than any of my other influences.
I
use a combination of hand-drawn, multi-plane, and (scant)
3D elements, which sometimes throws people for a loop -
is it drawn? is it modelled? I'm very satisfied with the
level of consistency I've been able to achieve, and I make
no apologies for not making it easier to suss out. I feel
that the best integration is quietly doing its job to envelope
the viewer, without fanfare.
I
set Honey in the nineteenth century for a few reasons. One,
I just like the time period. But also, a lot was happening
in the western world and many old notions, both good and
bad, were evaporating in the newly scientific and industrial
climate. Progress was palpable. I wanted my main character,
Christopher, to be at the center of the tearing of new from
old because his story is as much about finding his place
in the space between these warring concepts as it is his
personal struggle to come to terms with his father's disappearance.
Christopher's
bad-tempered teacher, the voice of everything superstitious
and rigid, is really echoing the grumblings of the age:
Can't we just stay as we are? Science fails to answer
all our questions. We were happier ignorant. The Beekeeper
is also a voice of the old world, but the gentler voice,
the essence of those who are sadly resigned to change and
progress. The boy is exposed to both these points of view,
but as an outsider, as a child of the age, his place in
the world is no clearer, though what he is leaving behind
is. Finally, what he must realize is the impulse to keep
moving, to keep going forward, somehow. Through his loyalty
to a missing father he remains inert, even keeping his mother
inert, and only through acceptance of the loss can he (and
she) move on. It was important that his missing father should
be a naturalist, those gentleman scientists of the nineteenth
century, not simply so the teacher would have something
to rail against, but also so the danger inherent in the
profession of discovery might help account for the fear
of progress on a very personal level."
