CLIENT
Jack Schwartz Shoes/Lugz.
PRODUCTION CO.
Curious Pictures, bicoastal. Jerry van de Beek, director/designer; Richard Winkler and David Starr, executive producers; Betsy De Fries, producer/co-designer; Steward Lee, designer/animator; Boo Wong, head of CG; Keith Chamberlain, lead 3-D animator; Max Ehrlich, animator; Jeeyun Sung and Mark Behm, assistant animators; Damon Chiarelli, visual effects artist/technical director; Kim Lee and Boris Ustaev, 3-D Studio Max technical directors; Neal Moreno, product photographer. Live action shot at Curious’ stages.
AGENCY
Amster Yard, New York. Jeff Weiss, creative director; Katya Bankowsky, senior producer; Tamara Brown, copywriter; Anton Ginzburg, art director.
AUDIO POST
Mirror Image Studios, New York. Troy Hightower, engineer.
MUSIC/SOUND DESIGN
Rawkus Records, New York. Pharoahe Monch, composer/ sound designer.
THE SPOT
The CGI "Decide & Conquer" uses a videogame look to highlight Lugz athletic shoes. In the :30, a hip male character, Fantm Sklz, maneuvers through the obstacles of New York City, finally arriving at his destination: a dance club where he steps up to the microphone and raps.
Spot broke Aug. 20.
Review: Writer-Director Adam Elliot’s “Memoir of a Snail”
It's not your typical stop-motion film when characters name pets after Sylvia Plath and read "The Diary of Anne Frank" — or when the story's inspired by a quote from existentialist thinker Søren Kierkegaard. And it's certainly not your typical stop-motion film when you find yourself crying as much as the characters do — in their case, with huge droplets leaking from bulging, egg-shaped eyes so authentic-looking, you expect the screen to get wet. But those are just a few of the unique things about Adam Elliot's "Memoir of a Snail," a film that's as heart-tugging as it is technically impressive, a work of both emotional resonance and great physical detail using only clay, wire, paper and paint. One thing Elliot's film is not, though, is for kids. So please take note before heading to the multiplex with family in tow: this film earns its R rating, as you'll discover as soon as young Grace, voiced by Sarah Snook, tells us she thought masturbation was about chewing your food properly. Sex, nudity, drunk driving, a fat fetish — like we said, it's R-rated for a reason. But let's start at the beginning. In this, his seventh "clayography" (for "clay" and "biography"), the Australian writer-director explores the process of collecting unnecessary objects. Otherwise known as hoarding, it's something that weighs us down in ways we can't see, for all the clutter. Elliot also argues that it helps us build constrictive shells around ourselves — like snail shells, perhaps. Our protagonist is Grace Pudel, voiced with a quirky warmth and plenty of empathy by the wonderfully agile Snook. We first encounter Grace as a grown woman, telling her long, lonely life story to her pet garden snail, Sylvia (named after Plath), at a moment of deep sadness. Then we flash... Read More