wow! thanks for posting these-automania 2000 is amazing!!!

I’m quite surprised Halas & Batchelor have let this one through. I can’t see it staying for long though unless there has been an agreement. For those interested in more on Halas, I can recommend the book, ‘Halas & Batchelor Cartoons. An Animated History.’ Southbank Publishing 2006. The book comes with a DVD in which you’ll find the wonderful Automania 2000 in all its full pixel glory.

Late 50’s and early 60’s shorts are the rock-candy of animation. So fun to look at and you can savour them for a long time :)

Okay, we got one parody of a Disney/Kimball edutainment animation and one imitation. The imitation was a little dull and flat.

Here’s an amusing gee-whiz Disney original:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6S18LCISRm4
Especially liked the punch card and the tireless atom.

Snickering while wondering what’s up with Zeus and Hermes…

This years episode of Dr. Who titled Gridlock’d seems to have borrowed from Automania 2000. In this episode the underground highway is one large traffic jam that has lasted 20 years, and the car passengers live their lives in their cars.

I have known of the existence of ‘AUTOMANIA 2000′ for decades, only having seen tantalizing clips in the past………..well worth the wait, and KINDA CHILLING in its own way………..

very chilling, indeed.

did anyone notice the early CG near the end of pan-tele-tron?
kinda rad, actually…

> I’m quite surprised Halas & Batchelor have let this one through. I can’t see it staying for long though unless there has been an agreement.

You know YouTube! I would’ve done the same thing too without expressive permission, though I’ll leave that for EastWestDVD to figure out. :-)

> For those interested in more on Halas, I can recommend the book, ‘Halas & Batchelor Cartoons. An Animated History.’ Southbank Publishing 2006. The book comes with a DVD in which you’ll find the wonderful Automania 2000 in all its full pixel glory.

Still need to get that, but yes, this film is a must-see either way. Also still quite relevant in today’s world. Often seeing that scene of the kids and the mother watching TV in their car reminded me of having grown up where a black & white TV was stuck in our RV I would watch whenever we were out of the house. I never thought about it then, but today’s modern equivalent would be the portable DVD player or video game console in the back of any SUV. I’ve often read about Halas’ concerns for how we might mistreat technologies in the future, and films like this one is a good example of the warnings we must abide to.

Hopefully I’ll never live to see the day when cars multiply like rabbits! :-)

I suppose Warner’s started it all with those lame “travelogue” shorts, but basing a cartoon around narration always seems to turn out a weak result. Even when Tex Avery did it it was painful to sit thru, but these examples just have the barest bit of ironic disconnect between the spoken and the seen to justify having the imagery at all.