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JERRY BECK
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AMID AMIDI
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Pellet Gunn by Tim Beckhardt
by amid
November 2, 2009 7:28 pm


I saw Tim Beckhardt’s Pellet Gun in Ottawa a couple weeks ago. It’s a student film from RISD. I liked the crisp linear style and it made me chuckle even though I didn’t get it. Tim explained it to me afterward, and the explanation was quite reasonable, which made me wonder why I didn’t get it in the first place.

11/2/09  8:21pm
ben c says:

after the comment about getting it, now I’m not sure if I do or not.

11/2/09  8:44pm

What I find really interesting is that the design seems to lend itself well to working digitally, but if I remember correctly Tim did everything entirely hand drawn. I would be curious to know what led to that choice, and what Tim thinks about it after going through that process.

11/2/09  10:06pm
Daniel M. says:

That was pretty good. If you know what the pun is based on, it’s pretty easy to understand. It looks like a well done mini comic.

11/3/09  3:40am
Eddie says:

Really fresh looking film. I didn’t get it fully either but that made me watch it a couple more times, which is a great thing for a short film to make you want to do. Still not completely sure if I totally get it. Maybe I’ll watch it once more!

11/3/09  5:47am

+1 to ben c

Anyone care to explain, or provide a link?

11/3/09  6:23am

I enjoyed the fresh drawing style,
the humble garage-style guitar track,
and all the bizzzarre scenes!

11/3/09  7:01am
FP says:

What’s not to get? This thing is quietly great. It reminds me of a Chris Miller story from an old NATIONAL LAMPOON, involving wormhole birth control and its disastrous consequences.

11/3/09  8:04am
bone says:

Excellent - It doesnt have to mean a thing.

11/3/09  8:45am
Chris Webb says:

Liked it alot! Tim, KEEP MAKING FILMS!

11/3/09  11:55am
timmyelliot says:

I liked it. It sort of reminded me of something out a Rudy Rucker novel, with its cyberpunk sensibility.

11/3/09  2:28pm
christy says:

SO AWESOME! LOVE THIS FILM!

11/3/09  3:36pm
doug holverson says:

As somebody who did too much Model Rocketry in my life, I loved the throwaway reference that the Rocket Hand hand two C engines.

Also the time wormhole bit about retrieving the dead guy’s head from the near future.

11/4/09  6:12am
THE GUYS says:

This was freakin’ GREAT!! Intelligent and funny. And bizarre!!

11/4/09  2:42pm
Hal says:

Just awesome. Abosolutely awesome. This is the kind of animation that really pushes into fun Ballard or Vonnegut style narratives. So great that sci-fi toons can grow up beyond 50’s kitsch love. I just checked out Tim’s other films too - “I TOOK A TRIP” evokes “THE MONK AND THE FISH,” “AMERICAN ASTRONAUT” and “REVOLVER” for me - no small praise that!

11/5/09  4:32pm

Hi - thanks for the comments everybody and Amid for posting this up.

Mike, everything was hand-drawn on paper then composited in After Effects (so I wasn’t totally un-digital). This film grew heavily out of my love of underground & alternative comix / old comic strips and other lo-fi forms, so the process of drawing on paper (hand-filling blacks, white-out, mistakes) was I felt really the only way to go. Even my crummy all-in-one fax/scanner/xerox became a part of the aesthetic.

I find that I often enjoy working with/against the limits imposed by such a process, and hope to keep that tension as I’m moving to more all-digital ways of working.

11/6/09  1:09pm

Could this be the smartest student film ever? It’s stronger and more pungent than it has any right to be, and it kicks butt!

11/11/09  12:55pm
stieg says:

i really like the different tones of black in the lines and fills.

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