Thursday, June 6, 2013
Fantastic Planet
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For the album by Failure, see Fantastic Planet (album).
This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (December 2009)
Fantastic Planet
French film poster.
Directed by
René Laloux
Produced by
Simon Damiani
Andre Valio-Cavaglione
Written by
Screenplay:
René Laloux
Roland Topor
Novel:
Stefan Wul
Music by
Alain Goraguer
Cinematography
Boris Baromykin
Lubomir Rejthar
Editing by
Dick Elliott
Rich Harrison
Distributed by
Argos Films
Release date(s)
6 December 1973
Running time
72 minutes
Country
France
Czechoslovakia
Language
French
Fantastic Planet (French: La Planète sauvage, lit. The Wild Planet) is a 1973 cutout stop motion science fiction allegorical film directed by René Laloux, production designed by Roland Topor, written by both of them and animated at Jiří Trnka Studio.[1] The film was an international production between France and Czechoslovakia and was distributed in the United States by Roger Corman. It won the special jury prize at the 1973 Cannes Film Festival.[2] The story is based on the novel Oms en série, by the French writer Stefan Wul. A working title for the film while it was in development was Sur la planète Ygam (On the Planet Ygam).[3] The film had a total of 809,945 admissions in France.[4]
Contents
[hide]
1 Plot
2 Cast
3 Themes
4 Soundtrack
4.1 Track listing
5 Video releases
6 Televised airings
7 References in other works
8 References
9 External links
Plot [edit]
This article's plot summary may be too long or excessively detailed. Please help improve it by removing unnecessary details and making it more concise. (February 2013)
The film depicts a future in which human beings, known as "Oms" (a homonym of the French-language word hommes, meaning men), are creatures on the Traags' home planet. The Traags are an alien species which is humanoid in shape but a hundred times larger than humans and they live much longer than human beings. Although some Oms are domesticated as pets, they are seen as pests and are periodically exterminated.
A group of Traag children accidentally kill an Om woman during play. Unfortunately her death leaves an orphaned infant, who is taken in by an adult Traag as a pet for his child, Tiva. Tiva’s father just happens to be master Sinh, the Traag great Aedile and after some time, when the child and pet are playing, they surprise him and several of his compatriots during a ritual melding session. It is revealed that many Traag children have Oms like Tiva's.
The bond created between the Traag child, Tiva, and the Om, named Terr (word play on the French word Terre, meaning Earth) deepens as time passes by. Tiva's education is supplied by the use of a headset that transmits knowledge directly into the brain of the user. Because she enjoys having Terr in her hand when she is having her "infos," Terr begins to acquire the Traag knowledge. Terr begins to realize who and what he is, and escapes, taking the headset with him.
He eventually finds other Oms and after some tribulation, is accepted into a tribe. Over the next several scenes, it is shown how the Oms have adapted to life on the Traags' planet. One day, the now-literate Oms reads a new sign on one of the walls, and learns the park is about to be "de-Omized." The de-Omizing is accomplished using disks that release a poison gas. A great many Oms perish from this gas, but a sizable number still manage to escape.
The Oms retaliate and manage to kill one of their Traag attackers. The death of the Traag puts the Council in an uproar. De-Omizing is stepped up to a much higher priority, new technologies are developed, and extermination frequency greatly increases.
Fatalities resulting from Traag attempts to de-Omize are minimized by the creation and organized use of shelters, but the Traags' updated technologies become ever more aggressive, and when an automated scout detects the persistent Om settlement, it summons an array of lethal devices. The Oms launch manned rockets toward the Fantastic Planet, where they discover headless humanoid statues. As Traag meditation bubbles descend to alight atop the statues, the statues begin to dance. This is the secret that animates the statues and allows the Traags to reproduce. When the feet of the dancing statues threaten the rockets, the Oms use disintegration weapons to shatter the statues, which in turn makes thousands of meditative Traag to go insane. Pandemonium reigns in the Council chamber, for it seems the two species will destroy one another if they cannot find a way to live together. While the Traag council continues to think of revenge, it is proposed that the two species finally create peace between each other.
The last scene proves that peace has been made as an Om steps down off an outstretched Traag hand, removes his silly hat and assumes a posture of confidence and self-assertion.
Cast [edit]
Jennifer Drake as Tiva (voice)
Eric Baugin as Terr (voice)
Jean Topart as Master Sinh (voice)
Jean Valmont as adult Terr and the commentator (voice)
Themes [edit]
This article may contain original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research may be removed. (August 2008)
The film is chiefly noted for its surreal imagery, the work of French writer and artist Roland Topor. The landscape of the Traag planet is full of strange creatures, including a cackling predator which traps small fluttering animals in its cage-like nose, shakes them to death and hurls them to the ground. The Traag practice of meditation, whereby they commune psychically with each other and with different species, is shown in transformations of their shape and colour.
The interaction of science and superstition is most apparent in the Wizard, who resists the knowledge that Terr brings, fearing it will erode the power he maintains. Knowledge trumps ignorance, but in this case only after surviving an attempted assassination.
Terr's drive to share knowledge overpowers the fear of an unknown people. Only his courage to save others not of his adopted tribe allows that tribe to overcome the loss of their leader.
The Traags and Oms finally learn to live in peace and mutual benefit; presumably any groups can if they and their leaders really want to. This may have been a theme favoured by the filmmakers as it was made and released during the Cold War (the source novel was first published in 1957).
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Two FBI Agents Involved in Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s Arrest 'FALL' Out of Helicopter and Die
I have no idea how I missed this story from May 22nd:
The FBI agents, who eliminated Boston terrorist Tamerlan Tsarnaev, died as they fell out of a helicopter, the press service of the FBI said.
Two officers of the counter-terrorism department of the Federal Bureau of Investigation died on Friday, May 17. The incident occurred during training exercises conducted by the FBI at a distance of 12 nautical miles from the coast of the U.S. state of Virginia.
An official statement from the FBI says that special agents Christopher Lorek and Stephen Shaw fell out of a helicopter while training a complex exercise. The agents were supposed to be lowered on a rope on a ship from a helicopter. For yet unknown reasons, the two agents fell out of the helicopter and were killed in the fall.
"Like all who serve on the Hostage Rescue Team, they accept the highest risk each and every day, when training and on operational missions, to keep our nation safe. Our hearts are with their wives, children, and other loved ones who feel their loss most deeply. And they will always be part of the FBI Family," FBI Director Robert S. Mueller said in a statement, according to CNN.
More Info HERE
Like A Swede In ....Sweden?
'Jennifer Aniston Sex Tape' Draws 7.5 Million Views
What does it take for a bottled water brand’s Web video to become the Internet sensation du jour? Seemingly, not all that much. Smartwater’s“Jennifer Aniston Sex Tape” ranks a distant #1 on Advertising Age’s Viral Video Chart, at more than 7.5 million views. It contains no sexuality and isn’t even all that funny. But it does a brilliant job playing with the baser instincts of Internet users – and, in so doing, demonstrating…a) that there is a formula for viral success
b) that it’s really is as simple as you had always feared
The promise of celebrity skin + awkward humor + digital manipulation + a catchy title = gazillions of views
Grabbing attention is one thing, but will the views translate into sales? If the advertiser were a bank, a phone company, even an electronic gadget, the answer would likely be “no”. But this is an ad for bottled water, a relatively inexpensive product category where choices are often made on impulse. Bottled water is also a category where brand reallydoes matter a great deal – because there’s little to be had in the way of tangible benefits, and therefor little is expected. For SmartWater, the name of the game is to be top-of mind at point of purchase. To that end, “Jennifer Aniston Sex Tape” will likely deliver.
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