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john straiton
for the love
of it
by Barry and Greg Thomson
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Horseplay Animals in Motion
You have been labeled an amateur filmmaker. Professionals can be amateurs, in that they maintain an idealism, a love for making films.
An amateur is one who loves what he does. The reason I am into animation is because I happen to be able to do a lot of things in that area — not easily, but I can do things that not many individuals can do all as one person. Some people can write, others can draw, others can think editorially, while some people are technical. I can do all these as one person; that solves communication problems and eliminates a lot of psychological problems that working with other people might involve. I don’t have to earn my living in film.
Let’s talk about your intentions. In The Portrait of Lydia there are recurring motifs and images which apply to other of your films — women, snake, horse.
Portrait of Lydia was my first and — as far as I knew at the time — last film. So I just poured all kinds of images that I had scraped together into the one film. Then I started making other films and each one has one or more aspects from Portrait of Lydia. But Portrait of Lydia contained a lot of my inner feelings, ideas, images.
Barry and Greg Thomson, freelance writers from Toronto, are both graduates of York University where they worked, respectively as Associate Editor and Book Editor, on Pulse Magazine.
44/Cinema Canada
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Eurynome
Let’s discuss the image sequence in The Portrait of Lydia. Images appear to follow a pattern; for example, there is
a Bible, a courtroom, a woman, a skull, then a tombstone and so on.
I planned the film so that it goes in cycles because the music went in cycles. That is the reason for the repetition. Toward the end of the film I gave up the cycles because I got bored drawing the same things over and over. Up till then I stuck to my plan.
The basic idea of the film was about a girl who lived in a middle-sized Ontario town who was breaking free from her inhibitions. All my theories about religion and life are in the film. For example, religion is the super-ego which is ingrained by parents and the church. Lydia breaks free in her nakedness and someone touches her. Bang! All of a sudden the father appears, then the church and so forth. Her death is the ultimate punishment, probably.
Basically, the film represents the girl’s thoughts about love, sex, marriage.
Could you explain why Freud and Jung and mythology in general are catalysts to your animation ideas ?
Well, when I made Portrait of Lydia I was in fact carrying out a hunch I’d had years ago. I had been wondering whether there was some connection between art appreciation and dream symbolism. If in dreams a tree or shrubbery has a