Rejected - Quintessential

REJECTED
Directed by Don Hertzfeldt, United States, 2000, 9:21
Source: Bitter Films

Steve's choice of Rejected well represented the types of shorts we analyzed throughout the class. There are shorts within a short (Don's thirty second rejected cartoons), experimental (the lack of narrative structure in the rejected cartoons), commercials (Don's cartoons advertised companies), political (Don's tongue-in-cheek response to advertising Johnson & Mills: "I'm a consumer whore!" written over the child, "And how!" for father), and animation (the short is completely hand drawn on pencil and paper). On top of that, this was an award-winning short that swept the film festivals and received the Oscar for best animated short.

What I love about Rejected is how creative it is. As Steve said in his post, "the animation techniques at the end of the film, when the creator begins to go crazy, are very edgy and incredibly well executed." The style of animation reminds me of another short film, that is Oscar-nominated for this year: I Met The Walrus. Like Rejected, I Met The Walrus uses beautiful, eye-popping animation to tell the unique story of a 14-year-old interviewing John Lennon in an interactive, creative way. However, Rejected does not feature the massive amounts of After Effects and Photoshop that I Met The Walrus does.

The main point is that these two shorts are creative. Walrus heavily relies on out-of-the-box animation while Rejected relies on simplistic, paper-and-pencil animation. But if either style was made into a feature length, it would degrade the uniqueness of the short.

When it comes to short films in regards to features, I feel like filmmakers can do a lot with a short amount of time. They focus more on what to create rather than what to fill. With a shorter time, the quality is higher. With a longer time, the quality is harder to create; quantity is the key of the game when it comes to features.

So if Rejected was made into a feature, about rejected cartoons, the uniqueness of the short would be trying on the viewer by the twenty minute mark or so. I feel it would also be trying on the creator as well, having to animate for a longer, more complicated story for a longer amount of time. The uniqueness of Rejected stems from its simple plotline with outrageous, non-sequiter cartoons.

This is a testament again to how in a short amount of time, directors/animators have the freedom to be as creative as possible. Quality is emphasized, rather than the quantity. And in this short amount of time, different aspects of shorts can be referenced.