Clay puppets, miniature sets, cutouts, replacement animation, aluminum foil, “strato-cut” slices, molten wax, and other techniques…

The Silent Movie Theatre in Los Angeles is running two nights of rare goodies created by eccentric animator Bruce Bickford. First up, on August 24th, a rare showing (with permission from Gail Zappa) of The Amazing Mr. Bickford, which has never shown theatrically. Bickford will be in attendance for a Q&A after the 7:30pm screening. From the theatrer’s press release:

Bruce Bickford’s art–a hallucinatory stop-motion amalgamation of Peter Pan, Ray Harryhausen, and The Wild Bunch–is nothing short of amazing. Frank Zappa first used the incredible talents of self-taught claymation wizard Bickford as visual companions to his music in the film Baby Snakes, and continued this collaboration in The Amazing Mr. Bickford.

On Tuesday August 26th at 8pm the same theatre will screen “Cas’l and Other Unreleased Bruce Bickford Films”, showcasing some of Bruce’s early Super-8 experiments as a teenager, as well as his unfinished 45-minute opus Cas’l, featuring a live score by The Gaslamp Killer. Also, Bickford will be there to perform one of his “blues raps”. For more information visit CineFamily.org.

Jerry Beck

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