''Moon Breath Beat'' is a 1980 animated experimental student film by Lisze Bechtold about her cats turning into abstract figures.
Production
The film was made while Bechtold was a student at
California Institute of the Arts
The California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) is a Private university, private art school in Santa Clarita, California. It was incorporated in 1961 as the first degree-granting institution of higher learning in the US created specifically for ...
. Her instructor,
Jules Engel
Jules Engel (; March 11, 1909 – September 6, 2003) was an American filmmaker, painter, sculptor, graphic artist, set designer, animator, film director, and teacher of Hungarian origin. He was the founding director of the experimental anima ...
, asked the class to make a film answering the question, "What happens when an animator follows a line, a patch of color, or a shape into the unconscious? What wild images would emerge?"
Reception and legacy
Lisze Bechtold later went on to do visual effects on ''
FernGully: The Last Rainforest'' (1992) and ''
The Prince and the Pauper
''The Prince and the Pauper'' is a novel by American author Mark Twain. It was first published in 1881 in Canada, before its 1882 publication in the United States. The novel represents Twain's first attempt at historical fiction. The plot conce ...
'' (1990).
She collaborated on ''My Film, My Film, My Film'' (1983), which is in the collection of
MoMA
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...
, New York. She also writes children's books including the Buster the Very Shy Dog series and ''Toots the Cat''.
''Moon Breath Beat'' was selected to the United States
National Film Registry
The National Film Registry (NFR) is the United States National Film Preservation Board's (NFPB) collection of films selected for preservation (library and archival science), preservation, each selected for its cultural, historical, and aestheti ...
in 2014 as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
The film was preserved by the
Academy Film Archive
The Academy Film Archive is part of the Academy Foundation, established in 1944 with the purpose of organizing and overseeing the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' educational and cultural activities, including the preservation of mot ...
in 2016.
It has been described as "full of color, creepiness and unforgettable imagery".
See also
*''
Furies
The Erinyes ( ; , ), also known as the Eumenides (, the "Gracious ones"), are chthonic goddesses of vengeance in ancient Greek religion and mythology. A formulaic oath in the ''Iliad'' invokes them as "the Erinyes, that under earth take v ...
'' - Sara Petty's 1977 animated short film similar in content
References
External links
* {{IMDb title, 4288306, Moon Breath Beat
Homepage
1980 films
United States National Film Registry films
1980 animated short films
American animated short films
1980s American films
American student films