Bedrock City, the kitschy little theme park in Custer, South Dakota, was created in 1966 by a coalition of local concrete makers.

Now, artist/photographer Todd Oldham has discovered the park’s inner coolness. Oldham has been creating a series of art books, called Place Space, devoted to unusual environments, covering a variety of subjects - from John Waters quirky Baltimore home to the creative living spaces of art students at the Rhode Island School of Design.

Ammo Books has just released Oldham’s latest, Bedrock City, a collection of photographs of the funky stone age recreation area with an essay (wrapped around the book on the poster/dust jacket) by architect/designer Michael Graves.

This book isn’t for everyone. It’s an art book that’s a piece of art in of itself, but the subject matter is a lot of fun (the book even comes with a set of souvenir postcards). Recommended to all sophisticated Flintstone connoisseurs out there.

Oh, and if minimalist books about the citizens of Bedrock turn you on… I’ve got another one in the works I’ll be telling you more about in a few months.

A few months ago on Cartoon Brew we announced a new and affordable monthly advertising option on Cartoon Brew for independent companies, studios and individuals who couldn’t afford the standard rates that are charged by our ad partner Federated Media. We’ve just set up an Advertising page that offers all the details on this advertising option.

Also, here’s a shout-out to the advertisers who’ve already signed up. Yesterday, we put up two new Comic-Con related ads for:
Fleet Street Scandal
Hard Eight

Earlier advertisers include:
House Industries
Meathaus
House of Cool
Rembrandt Films

John and Faith Hubley in Annecy

Cima Balser, the wife of animation director Bob Balser, has written a fantastic piece for AWN about the early years of the Annecy International Animation Festival. As much fun as it is to attend the festival nowadays, I can only imagine the excitement of those glory years when one could mingle lakeside with the likes of Bobe Cannon, Chuck Jones, John and Faith Hubley, Pete Burness, Bill Littlejohn, George Dunning, Peter Foldes, Yoji Kuri, and all the other greats of animation that I so admire. Cima’s article is one of my favorite historical reads in recent months, and she offers many wonderful stories about the festival that I’d never heard, such as this one about the Hubleys:

“That was the year that John and Faith Hubley showed their Of Stars and Men. We had noticed that the French audiences were not restrained in any way from showing their regard for each film. As well as wild applause, there were equally loud boos, and worse yet, the sound of stomping feet walking out and slamming the door as loudly as possible.

“Each filmmaker, when their film was projected, was obliged to sit in the balcony box, which we all rapidly named “The Hot Box,” and take a bow — to either applause or boos, and in this case the boos were heartbreaking. John and Faith bowed and then exited as quickly as possible. I still firmly believe this is one of the most important and beautiful animated films ever made, and we tried to assuage their deep disappointment, and assure them this was a film for all time. Alas, it has been forgotten, which is a loss to all of us.”

Was privileged to see two new CG shorts last week: Disney Animation’s Glago’s Guest and Pixar’s Presto. Both films couldn’t be more different, yet both succeed in accomplishing their modest goals with style to spare.

Glago’s Guest is the second film from Disney’s new shorts unit, established by John Lasseter when hne took over the studio. The sole intent of producing new shorts at Disney is to experiment with style, test new techniques, and to develop new directors. Chris Williams was a story artist at Disney (Mulan, etc.) for fourteen years. His original tale of a Russian soldier stationed in a remote Siberian outpost is so far removed from what a Disney cartoon has been, it’s just what the staff needed to flex their muscles. To tell you what happens, or who his guests are, would ruin the experience - but the short is layered in luscious detail, and filled with more heart than most features ten times its length. It’s being released in 3-D on November 26th with Disney’s Bolt and it looks incredible in that format.

Pixar’s Presto is as perfect as any homage to classic Hollywood cartoons could be - especially with it’s opening title tribute to Disney shorts (against burlap) and MGM cartoons (note the type style). The story is a mash up of UPA’s Magic Fluke (1949), Avery’s Magical Maestro (1952), and Jones’ Case of the Missing Hare (1942) - magician versus his adversarial rabbit, who gets revenge via a magical hat. It’s the fast pace, strong poses, appealing characters and visual gags that turn this into a charming original entertainment - top notch fun from first frame to last. An absolute winner from Pixar. Catch it on the head of Wall-E this weekend at a theatre near you.

These shorts are special - that’s something we can’t usually say about short form films. I’m delighted Disney is producing films like these. Could a modern day equivalent of Melody Time grow out of such a program? After seeing these two, that wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

Comedian George Carlin has died at 71. Below is the 1985 short Drawing on My Mind, written and narrated by Carlin and directed by the accomplished Bob Kurtz.

While I work up a few reviews from the Annecy International Animation Festival, held earlier this month in France, check out the Annecy festival openings created by groups of students at French animation school Gobelins. My favorite openings this year are Garuda and La ballade sauvage.

There’s minimalist animation and then there’s Grant Orchard’s work. His short Park Foot Ball (mentioned on the Brew back in 2006 is a masterpiece of graphic clarity and communication. I was pleased to learn in this interview Grant recently did with The Animation Show that Italian broadcaster Qoob has commissioned him to do ten more sports-themed shorts based on the pared-down graphic and aural approach of Park Foot Ball. The first of the ten new “Love Sport” shorts—Paintballing—can be viewed below. I can’t wait for the rest of the series.

Celbi Pegoraro noticed on his blog Animation-Animagic.com that the poster for Disney’s upcoming Bolt bears a striking resemblance to the thunderbolt poster designs of Disney’s Hercules.