Thursday, 19 November 2009
Contextual and Theoretical Studies Week 2:Describe 'The Uncanny' in an animated film
The animated film i have chosen that has the uncanny effect in is 'Monster House', following Polar Express the film is only the second film to use performance capture and it was said that the film makers wanted to avoid criticism from audiences and avoid the same fate as Polar Express, as the animation and facial looks were toned down from being 'Ultra-Photorealistic looks so the audience were not "creeped out" and was the effect of the Uncanny Valley which is believed to be the lifelike of a robot or similar things that have the exact lifelikes of a human but has a dip in the graph of human reactions to robots reactions.
I had chosen Monster house as it has the Uncanny effect as the story begins with the audience following the main character Dustin J. "D.J" Walters as he spends most of his free time watching the house across from his, which is owned by a mean old man who terrorizes anyone who comes near his home, as the story progresses DJ and his chubby friend Charles "Chowder" are playing basketball which lands on teh old mans lawn, DJ goes to pick the ball up but gets grabbed by the old man who has a stroke after DJ starts screaming and when the paramedics take the old man away, who is supposedly dead, DJ sees a gold key on the lawn and takes it. That night DJ gets a call from teh old mans house which is just moaning and groaning hearing this DJ calls Chowder and they agree to investigate and when Chowder rings the bell the house attempts to eat him, running back to DJ's house they spend the night watching the house and unknowingly knowing that DJ's sisters ex-boyfriend had already been eaten by the house.
The next day Jennifer "Jenny" Bennet is selling halloween chocolates and when she goes to the house across from DJ's and seeing this DJ and Chowder run out to warn her before she could be eaten and after almost being eaten Jenny calls the police but when they get there the house doesn't react when the kids are teasing it. They then go to ask advice from Reginald "Skull" Skullinski who says that the home "Domus Mactibilis" (Deadly Home, in Latin) when a human soul emerges with a man-made structure. The children then begin to believe that it is the old man back from the dead and that they should destroy the heart to get rid of the house and DJ notices that the chimney has been smoking (like a beating heart) ever since the old man is seemingly dead. The children then create a dummy filled with cold medicine hoping to drug the house but as the house was about to eat the dummy the police return and arrest the children for taking the cold medicine and place them in the car but then the house eats the police and the car but the children get out in time.
The kids then explore the house which they then notice that the house has fallen asleep because they see lights in the shape of a 'Uvula' and Chowder believes it to be the heart and as the other two kids continue searching the house they begin to find demoliton tools and a locked cage which DJ opens with the key he took from the lawn and find the body of Constance the Giantess, the wife of the old man, covered in cement and then the house realizes that the kids are inside and starts to attack them but the kids escape by pulling on the Uvula and in which the house 'Vomits' them out. As the kids return home the old man returns home in a n ambulunce in which the kids realize that it wasn't the old mans soul but constances soul which is merged with the home.
Going to the old man about what they know he tells the kids the whole story, that he had met the obese woman fromthe circus and fell in love with her and helping her escape from the circus, the old man began building the home that constance always wanted but still kids taunted her for her large appearance and on one occasion on halloween they threw eggs and tomatoes at her to which she chased them and lost her footing and was falling off the houses foundation and as she atempted to grab on to the cement mixers lever, the cement began to pour onto her as she fell to the ground and was coverd mostly in cement. The old man had finished the house despite constance's death, yet found that her soul had merged with the home and the old man had begun to get the reputation of a child-hater because he tried to keep children away from the home and from the wrath of constance.
However the old man believed it was time to destroy the house but the house overhears and grows four tree parts as legs and goes after the kids and the old man and as they run away they run towards a construction site which the old man attemtps to throw a dynamite stick at the house with no effect DJ begins to climb a crane and throws a dynamite stick down the chimney of the house where it reaches the furnace of the home and blows up the house completely. The kids then see the old man dancing with the spirit of constance as she fades away and DJ apologizes to the old man but the old man thanks DJ for freeing him and constance from being trapped for 45 years. The story finishes off with the kids and the old man giving the toys he had taken over the years to trick 'r' treaters and Jenny says she wants to hang out with DJ and Chowder sometime as they all leave and after the credits audience see people who had been eaten by the home walking out from the foundation of the home.
I believe that the animated film 'Monster House' has the Uncanny effect because it resembles the house as this living being in the scenes where the lights in hallway is seen as the Uvula, when the children pull on the 'Uvula' the house vomits making the effect that the house is sick and the basis that the house's 'heart' was the furnace as it kept the home warm or 'living' as the heat is flowing through the home, to me the home was made to feel like it was human due to the story being that the house was possessed by Constance and that using such affects as the furnace is the heart to make the audience believe that home was haunted and lifelike. Also the creators of the film, i believe are trying to portray the house as a human using certain objects of the house as human movements thus making it Uncanny to the extent people wouldn't believe a home to be a living human because it is doing the opposite of what it was constructed to do and that is stay still and provide shelter.
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