SOCIETY AND BELONGING
3 Animated Short-Films Everyone Should Watch
The Man Who Planted Trees, This Land is Mine, Man
Some of the previous articles I have written touched the topic of digital addictions and consuming digital media intentionally.
So you already know that I am wary of “watching” videos online in general.
As all forms of expressions, films too reduce complex matters into consumable bits. More so than writing, since you have much more limited space trying to explain a topic with the aid of visual materials.
So you have to compress, meaning erase the peripheral, the “insignificant” and tell a story of the most “remarkable”.
In that sense, you highly likely skip tons of small pieces of information and focus on a topic from a very simplified perspective.
But exactly for that reason cinema is a form of art that has the ability to carry very powerful messages in ways we can consume easily*.
*Doesn’t mean you will feel lightly afterwards.
Enough rambling about cinema. Let’s get to the short films I wanted to recommend to you.
This Land is Mine by Nina Paley (2012)
As a kid born in the 20th century, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict feels to me as one of the most difficult to resolve conflicts in the world.
I am highlighting the “feels to me” to point out the fact that we observe events in our own lifespan and possibly magnify them therefore. Yes I did learn to question my anecdotal experience thanks to Nassim Nicholas Taleb.
Anyways.
This conflict has always pained me to follow. Then again what conflict doesn’t?
When I saw Nina Paley’s powerful animation of the entire history of conflicts in that region, I was naturally filled with emotions; sadness, anger, sadness, hope?
The animation is accompanied by the song “Exodus” by Pat Boone and powerfully illustrates the history of the conflicts in a crash-course like manner.
Although said before, I feel the need to highlight, it’s a film and even a short one in that category.
So don’t take this as your source to learn about the complicated history of this region. This is a form of art with a pinch of historical facts the artist chose to highlight. The message is what matters: “Stop killing in the name of whatever.”
Lastly, I can’t help but put a trigger warning. If you can’t see blood even in the animated form, don’t watch this.
Man by Steve Cutts (2012)
There is a chance that you might have already seen this one given that it was watched by 60 million people on Youtube itself.
This film also gives us a historical perspective, the entire history of “man” in snippets from the angle of “his” consumption and cruelty.
Normally it makes me furious when “man” and “he” are used to describe an average human. But this time I feel like it feels fair.
Double-standards much?
Well, yes, I have some of them too.
Trying to create awareness of our never-ending consumerism, this film pretty much explains why humans suck.
Trigger warning again: if you can’t watch living creatures being killed then don’t.
The artist also created a post-pandemic version of the original video. It’s called Man 2020, you can find it here.
The Man Who Planted Trees by Frédéric Back (1987)
Original title: L’homme qui plantait des arbres
This is my favourite one of the three.
The film is about a shepherd who re-forests an entire valley in solitude without interruptions even as the two World Wars pass him by.
It’s also longer so you will need 30 minutes to watch. For me these were 30 minutes well spent.
The use of colours is very restricted, fitting perfectly with the notion of humility the film carries along. Humility towards one another, humility towards our existence in the universe.
I won’t say more about the content because you will hear it from the beautiful narration by Christopher Plummer.
So enjoy it.
Things I can’t help but address:
Where the hell are women?
Didn’t they kill, didn’t and don’t they consume, couldn't they have planted trees between the two World Wars?
Of course, they did, they do and they could have.
Don’t let the artists’ lack of female representation fool you, just put the women in there in your mind interchangeably with men. It’s like half of the human population on earth god damn.
Why did I choose to present the short films in this order?
These films each evoke different emotions in me.
- The first one is emotionally very powerful, possibly due to sharp colours used in the illustration and the song that fits it too well. I believe this one will make you sad, angry, but let you see a fraction of hope, if the people fighting could ever see the pattern of indoctrination and desire followed by killing and get out of that vicious cycle.
- The second one will make you feel angry, disgusted, pessimistic but self-critical wondering what could have been different.
- The third one, owing partially to its length, has more extensive storytelling and lesser reliance on digital animation techniques to evoke the emotions in you and hence will sober you up. But it will also fill you with hope.
Hope is where I like to end my writings.
If my writing was music I would want it to be a piece by Chopin or Brahms*, painful but with a hint of hope.
*Not that I can ever be as great as those two.
