Week 1 - History of Animation

Television Era – The Dark Age of Animation

(~1958 – 1985)

"TV is such a monster. It swallows up all this animation so fast that nobody seems to care whether it's good or bad. These kids’ shows are badly done technically; it seems as though nobody really looks at them but the kids...the networks don't look at the show, they just look at the ratings. If the ratings are good, to heck with the show. They don't care whether it's just a bouncing ball."

-Friz Freleng-

            From the mid-1950s to the 1980s, the animation experienced big quality drop. It was mainly caused by the U. S. Supreme Court, which enacted the elimination of block booking. Block booking was a system of selling multiple films to a theatre as a unit. Theatre owners were practically forced to buy large number of studio’s pictures sight unseen. Those studios could then divide the product into A and B movies. After the Supreme Court order, studios were expecting huge profit-loss. They decided to cut production schedules and ended contracts with actors, directors and other staff. Newly unemployed artists began their careers in television industry.

The rise of television provided new market for animation in commercials and TV series. Since there was bigger and bigger demand for animation, the quality was getting worse. Broadcasters wanted large quantities of cost-effective animation, but the artists weren’t able to hold the quality level high, so they instigated a culture of limited animation. Not all limited animation was bad. High-quality writing could make up for low-quality production.

For makers of commercials the budgets were increasing, because global brands wanted to be associated with the clever ideas and eye-catching designs that were possible with animation

            Although the demand was big and artists did not have much time to focus on the quality of production, this era enriched us of few very good stories. I am now going to focus on the most significant and interesting animations from the USA, UK and the Czech Republic.

USA

            After closing of MGM’s animation unit, Joseph Barbera and William Hanna, Tom and Jerry directing team, decided to form their own production company. In 1958 they hit the jackpot with The Huckleberry Hound Show. Huckleberry was a countryman with a characteristic southern lazy talk, voiced by Daws Butler. Huckleberry was taking on many of different jobs and was often addressing the audience and commenting his adventures.

            In 1959 Walt Disney returned with Sleeping Beauty. It was made in widescreen and was Disney’s longest-running animation. The wider frames allowed more details and the studio wanted Sleeping Beauty to look like living illustration. The production designer was Ken Anderson and Eyvind Earle did lot of design work and background painting. The music was adapted from Tchaikovsky’s ballet Sleeping Beauty. Critics did not like the film. They considered it slow-moving and emotionally cold. Sleeping Beauty cost $6 million and it took Walt Disney close to bankruptcy.

Next Disney’s film One hundred and One Dalmatians was set in a modern time. It was the first Disney movie to use Xerox process. Without Xerox it would not have been possible to create the film, because the artist were now able to, for example, duplicate the same puppy animation many times across a frame.

In 1964 Disney produced musical Marry Poppins, film where is animation mixed with live action. Another Disney’s musical was The Jungle Book, produced in 1967. The Aristocats was the last film which was approved by Walt Disney before his death in 1966.

            During the Dark Age of Animation made Tim Burton his first short stop-frame film Vincent. In 1982 Steven Liesberger’s Tron was produced, the first feature film to be based around computer animation.

UK

                     In 1965 cartoon series Yellow Submarine was produced by TVC. It has awesome musical sequences and each song was animated in a different visual style. The artists fully used the technology that was available at the time.

            When animator Terry Gilliam arrived in London, he was employed as a sketch writer for BBC alongside Michael Palin, Eric Idle and Terry Jones. When Michael Palin, Eric Idle and Terry Jones began to put together new show with John Cleese and Graham Chapman, Terry Gilliam was invited as well. Mothy Python’s Flying Circus was born and it soon became iconic television comedy.

            During the Punk Era was released short film Ubu, animated by Geoff Dunbar. The film won several festival prices.

            In 1982 adaptation of Raymond Briggs’ children’s graphic novel The Snowman was produced, directed by Dianne Jackson. This film has become Christmas TV tradition and was probably the most successful of British family animation.

Czech Republic

            For most of the Television Era, even Czech Republic was not far behind the USA or UK. Karel Zeman’s Vynález zkázy (The Fabulous World of Jules Verne) brought international acclaim and many people consider it his masterpiece. It is based on Jules Vernes’ novel Face au drapeau (Facing the Flag) and designed like the kind of illustration style that would have been in the original of the book.

Another significant artist was surrealist Jan Švankmajer. His experience with puppetry and experimental theatre can be seen in his masterpiece Možnosti dialogu (Dimensions of Dialogue), which he made with the aid of animator Vlasta Pospíšilová. It is a classic surrealist stop frame and won many awards worldwide. His another significant piece was Něco z Alenky (Alice, 1988). Jan retold Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland. The inhabitants of Wonderland are there made mostly of 

household objects, food or bones. 

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huckleberry_Hound

http://allthetropes.wikia.com/wiki/Limited_Animation

http://io9.com/what-killed-the-golden-age-of-cartoons-1442953925

https://allthetropes.orain.org/wiki/The_Golden_Age_of_Animation

http://allthetropes.wikia.com/wiki/The_Dark_Age_of_Animation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Block_booking

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_animation#The_television_era

Stephen Cavalier - The World History of Animation