On the topic of Character and story development, an interesting piece that brings to attention the ever-morphing and developing character is the stop motion animated short “Love me, Fear me” (Solomon, 2018). The character starts outperforming and basking in the attention; however, the spotlight moves as soon as the audience grows bored of them. They refuse to be shoved aside and run after the spotlight, changing into somebody else entirely to please the crowd. This character solely drives the narrative; the only other ‘character’ is the lighting reflective of a non-existing audience. Metamorphosis compliments the characterisation effectively, as the clay’s colour and shape show us changes in character and drive the narrative throughout the story.
The story seemingly progresses through the life of someone struggling with personality and being accepted, starting with a childish demeanour and design, the spotlight changes and the character has to adapt to the new audience (new phase of life); they morph into a more human-like and sexualised form in order to please those around it. The character dances and adapts in ways the audience cheers for until the attention is again drawn away elsewhere. This time after dancing for a short while, the character understands that at this stage, the way they present themselves will not gain the approval from the current audience, as such, they adapt much faster morph into a shaper and almost angrier form (potentially showing young rebellion). As the spotlight fades yet again and the attention is redirected, the character attempts to keep their sharp and rebellious personality and is greeted with silence. This causes them to form into a white ghost, representing the regret of the characters changing, as we can see when there is a ‘shadow’ of themselves. Suddenly, the environment changes from a spotlight on one person to the character realising the spotlight is not on them and that everyone in the world has the same light on them at all times. The character begins to break down, somewhat reminiscent of a midlife crisis. They morph into a chimaera of conflicting personalities fighting and wrestling before forming a ball and burning out. This is when the character realises they are not unique and becomes a blank form, rejecting any parts of their previous personalities.
Much like the former,’ Manipulation’ (Greaves, 1991) abuses the method of metamorphism and uses the permanent unrest of animation to portray effective character development and emotions. Although initially rejected by the artist, the character enters the screen with a splash of colour to show they are complete. Upon moving, the colour immediately leaves the character, leaving them empty. After re-absorbing the colour to make them feel whole again, the colour still does not stick to them. This time, the colour reappears, they proceed to form the paint into a ball to interact and play around with, attempting to grasp and understand this alien world around them.
Eventually, the artist rejects the characters colour ideals and ties him up to perform in the way the artist envisions all thee while stretching a deforming and even damaging the character in parts. The character cuts the strings the artist attached and attempts to escape; however, the artist catches him and manipulates him until the character fights back. The artist continues to punish his creation through stretching and controlling the world in which he exists until the character gets so angry that he starts to tear at his world. We see the personification of his anger as he morphs into fireworks. As he fights with the world in which he lives, the character manages to morph himself into a 3D form fighting against the artist and escaping his prison. He is pushed and falls to the ground, losing his 3D shape; the character returns to his original design, and the artist scraps him as we can see he has done with previous works before. The drawn character and the hand seem to have a direct interpersonal relationship, and the whole piece could be a metaphor for the struggling artist fighting themselves in the face of rejection and exemplifying the characters development from the tormentation that can be associated with childhood and the beginning of life, to individualism that arises from pressures that mature a person in later life.
Both ‘Love me, Fear me’ and ‘Manipulation’ show interesting character-driven narratives that use the animated form as a tool in the story and character development. The clay itself becomes a character, more so than the character it intends to present, and psychosocially links the viewer to the artist in a way that makes them understand that what they are viewing was made by hand. The ever-changing shaping of the clay shows impressions of human interaction in the very aesthetics and the ever-present ‘god-like’ hand shows an interaction between animation and the real world. Both are fighting for their place in the real world almost, and this desire is the key element that drives them to survive and adapt to their environment in very visually expressive ways.
Filmography
GREAVES, D. 1991. [Film]. Manipulation. United Kingdom: Tandem Films
SOLOMON, V. 2018. [Film]. Love Me, Fear Me. Germany
Further Research Potentials-
Looking into animated documentary form as a specialisation, and the validity of its factual representation is often something considered and argued. For further research, I could potentially look into the arguments surrounding this and analyse more into the potentials of the animated documentary in the future. Looking further into this, I could look at the specific genres- such as documentaries like Waltz with Bashir (2008) and silence (1998), which represent war victims trauma visually in expressive ways.
Key books could include-
- Annabelle Honess Roe- Animated Documentary, 2013
- Paul Wells- Animated genre and Authourship,
- The Animation Studies Reader- 2019