As reported by Entertainment Weekly, Oscar-winning director Guillermo del Toro recently revealed his thoughts on contemporary animation and declared his “hate” for sassy animated families. The Hollywood Reporter stated that during a master class at the Annecy International Animation Festival held this week, the director argued that the characters and emotions in some modern animation have been “codified into a sort of teenage rom-com, almost emoji-style behavior.”
The director, who earlier this year won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature for his version of Pinocchio, stated that he’s irritated that so many of the characters in mainstream animation have the same quirks and appear to share the same personalities. In Pinocchio, Del Toro specifically focused on making the characters in his stop-motion film seem lifelike.
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Del Toro said, “[If] I see a character raising his f—ing eyebrow, or crossing his arms, having a sassy pose — oh, I hate that s—. [Why] does everything act as if they’re in a sitcom? I think it is emotional pornography.”
Still, despite his criticisms, del Toro also gave praise to some of the recent “rule-breaking” films that he believes have avoided the aforementioned stereotypes.
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Guillermo Del Toro Called Animation “The Purest Form of Art” Adding That the Craft Has Been “Kidnapped by a Bunch of Hoodlums”
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He said, ”The three hits of [Across the] Spider-Verse, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Mario are moving things, allowing a little more latitude, but there are still big fights to be had. Animation to me is the purest form of art, and it’s been kidnapped by a bunch of hoodlums. We have to rescue it. [And] I think that we can Trojan-horse a lot of good s— into the animation world.”
The Pan’s Labyrinth director has long been a firm believer that animation has no age limit and encouraged the industry to offer more animated movies that showcase “real life.”
Del Toro said, “All the families are happy and sassy and quick, everyone has a one-liner. Well, my dad was boring. I was boring. Everybody in my family was boring. We had no one-liners. We’re all f—ed up. That’s what I want to see animated. I would love to see real life in animation. I actually think it’s urgent. I think it’s urgent to see real life in animation.”
The filmmaker added, “In animation, everyone is very efficient. If they sit and grab a glass of water, they do it in four movements. In real life, we do it in eight and we usually kind of f— it up. So I said: Let’s make things inefficient. [I think] particularly now, we need things that look like they were made by humans to recuperate the human spirit. I f—ing hate perfection. I love things that look handmade.”
Considering Del Toro’s unquestionable passion for animated films, it’s no surprise that the filmmaker plans to shift his focus solely to animation in the future.
Del Toro noted, “There are a couple more live-action movies I want to do, but not many. After that, I only want to do animation. That’s the plan.”
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