Length: 02:17
Logline: A paintball game gets out of hand and turns into a full scale war.
This charming computer animation is part of Orchard's Love Sport series and gives a comical view on who plays these games and how easily it can escalate. There are hidden depths of course as such an epic subject matter like this usually does. Look closer for a stark comment on the wastage of human life caused by war, the ease of how a series of events can lead to mass destruction and how war itself is akin to a mere game.
Individuals are made up of solid coloured squares or rectangles yet amazingly even such simple shapes are likable and have real character. There are two teams, the greens and the blues. The competition between the two spirals further and further from a few individuals in combat with guns to a whole army where planes, bombs and machine guns are used. The colour scheme is kept simple with luminous colours used to indicate the paint balls or paint bombs. Interestingly, although a whole spectrum is utilised, red is only used once and it signifies real blood. A nice decision.
Animation is clean, stylish, increasingly complex and with a thoughtfully composed kind of one-take shot sequence to it on top of that. A twist comes at the end when after total carnage has occurred leaving the last survivor driven to madness, the siren belts out, indicating the end of the game, and everyone resurrects bar the one who's killed himself. Not only a comic conclusion but a bitter sweet statement as well.
Best Bit: Firing into the pit trap.
Worst Bit: Giving one of the characters a voice, but that's clutching at straws really.
Final thought: Looking forward to viewing some others in the series.
Read a condensed review of this film on Twitter here.
No comments:
Post a Comment