ME review
Why Don’t You Come Up Sometime and See ME
a quote from Mae West to Cary Grant in She Done Him Wrong (1933)
Don Hertzfeldt’s new 21 minute animated pantomime film ME, stars an eye as a lead character, I being another form of the personal pronoun me. The entire cast communicates in speech bubbles, yet, the bubbles contain no letters of the alphabet, only two punctuation marks, either question marks (?) or exclamation points (!), along with several symbols, including a heart and the visual theme of the film-a half circle or bowl. Other primary shapes (circles, triangles, rectangles, and squares) are easily identified throughout the frame. The film also has a recurring motion layer of black-and-white dots, slashes, splatters and or confetti whether the set is exterior (sometimes as rain) or interior. Implied line of movement is added with a few characters, such as pain emanating from a blow, and several objects, such as shimmering rays of the sun or the pulsing electric current through power lines.
Don’s shot arrangement sets him apart from the pack. In pantomime film history a French writer/actor/director, Jacques Tati, established the bar in this genre using long and extreme long shots with multiple focal points, combined with outstanding ambient sound and background music. Complex, and seen and heard (especially Brent Lewis’ two songs) throughout ME. In pantomime animation history the Pink Panther comes to mind with the appearance of a physically similar character at the end of ME, though, its brain is exposed and it spouts blood. It breaks pantomime by lip-synching lyrics to a classical music background song (a Hertzfeldt signature), however, even though it is in English the operatic words are unintelligible. Repetition and multiplication take place as several different The End film screens accompany the song; along with piles of human corpses seemingly alternating the lead vocals. The subsequent finale number contains the only discernible spoken language in the film with Jelly Roll Morton’s background music lyrics of “Sweet Jazz Music.”
ME is worth 21 minutes of your life (or watch it over and over). It’s a testament that fine art can be enjoyed by a mass audience and even more important that you can make a living doing so. With arthouse film theaters and art galleries on the wane, you can still see some modern art, Don Hertzfeldt’s short ME, online at Vimeo for a fun visual vacation.
disclaimer Don Hertzfeldt graciously donated the three awesome images from World of Tomorrow Episode 2: The Burden of Other People’s Thoughts (2017) to Adult Swim and Comedy 4, 2019.
