ࡱ> WYV#` CObjbj .\CGDDDD`$hghht P:Ő<D;40N4hh|F D   @@ Animation dates back to 1825 when John A. Paris made the first thaumatrope, a disc with one image on each side that spun on strings attached to each end (fig01). This was an optical toy that opened the doors to the future phenakistoscopes, zoetropes, and magic lamps (fig02). In the decades afterwards, animation maintained its roots in optical illusion, being seen as party amusements and entertainment for house guests. However, in the 1870s, people began to further market these illusions to a wider audience, thereby allowing new innovations and adding narrative to these animated images which in the remaining years developed into what we understand today as animated cinema and television. In todays society, animation has found many outlets. Seen as TV shows, films, advertisements, and gallery exhibitions, it has become diverse in its uses. It is used as a form of social commentary, a means of propaganda, of raising military morale, promoting morals, and for pure comedy. Each of these purposes rely on the psychological connection that iconic imagery and motion has with a viewer. As humans, we relate life to motion and we create identity through icons. By simplifying our recognition of characters and maintaining our belief that the motions are real, animation psychologically connects us in to its narrative. In modern day, animators have analyzed this connection with the audience in their work, creating films and shorts which reflect the intangible qualities of the mind. Taking advantage of the techniques of animation, animators have been able to create works about psychology. This paper will analyze animations where psychology has become the topic. Because of social and political history, psychology as the theme of animation is primarily found within Japan. This is likely due to the influence of World War II and the aftermath of the atomic bombings in their country. Immediately following the war, Japans animation history reflected that of Europes; consisting of individual artists and small studios, the industry had its few successes, but lacked the industry-wide popularity that Disney had created in America. Osamu Tezuka, manga artist and animator who lived between 1928 and 1989, is the most influential person in the development of Japanese animation. Tezuka maintained a delicate balance between art and commercialism in his productions, concerned with both the communication of the media as well as the message it provided. His works centered on social participation, acting as commentaries that promoted peace. In Jumping, a short film done in 1984, the viewer sees from the perspective of the protagonist. The viewer jumps into the air, each time reaching higher and higher, but also falling deeper and deeper until he plunges into hell. According to Tezuka, this was a commentary on how humans have the tendency to go too far with what we do. Often this becomes a dilemma or catastrophe (Bendazzi 415). In addition of several of his other works, including [one from Masters of Animation that I cant find] and Ayako (1972-1973 a story of the fall of the Tenge Family), Tezuka focused on war and its effects on people. His commentary animations delved into the minds of those who had witnessed the all-to-recent events of WWII that he and his viewers shared. This further opened the door towards the general analysis of the human mind within animation. (video x2) Uchyu-Kansen Yamato, directed by Reiji Matsumoto in 1978-81, marked the transition from the simple comedies of past productions to the more psychologically in-depth works of present day. Uchyu-Kansen Yamato (video) is an animation about piloted human-shaped robots that defend the earth from space monsters. This animation transforms World War II into a futuristic space war . These science fiction war stories, featuring believable characters with realistic psychological reactions, represented a departure from the stereotypical productions of the past. (link Bendazzi, page 412) This was the first animation to explore the human mind as it related to war. Barefoot Gen, written by Keiji Nakazawa in 1978, was originally a manga series turned into an animation (along with a live action film as well). It told the story of a young boy, Gen, as he witnesses the dropping of the first atomic bomb in Hiroshima and the aftermath of the suffering civilians. From the introduction of the main characters, to the dropping of the bomb, to the desperate searches for food in the aftermath, to the small hope of growing grass in the end, we are connected to the characters and experience this catastrophe in war from the perspective of those who were there. The bombing starts out as seen from a pilots perspective, a small puff of cloud far away. It is detaching and seems nonchalant from this view. But then we cut to the people of Hiroshima and an extensive series of detailed clips of the civilians being vaporized. We see the survivors struggle with the effects of nuclear radiation. Gen loses his hair; Gens mother loses her baby due to malnutrition; a soldier coughs up blood and dies; a manor lord is ignored by his family b/c of his rotting flesh. Food is poisoned; water is undrinkable. The reactions of the people towards each other change. As food becomes scarce, there is a hostile race to fend for oneself and yet when a woman sees Gens mother desperately trying to find milk for her newborn, she offers her own because her own baby had died from the explosion. By seeing these interactions and details about a society of real personas shown in animation, we see into the minds of the characters and see the psychological effects of war upon a people. (video youtubes barefoot gen clip) European animation has primarily consisted of social commentaries done by small groups or individual artists, which has much to do with their political history. Given the restrictions many of the countries had on the media, artists chose to make their commentaries through metaphors in animation. Fantastic Planet, a 1973 animation, was a collaboration between Czechoslovakia and France during the time of the Cold War. In the film, Terr, an orphaned human (in this movie, called an Om), runs away from his Draag owners (a blue alien species) with technology that can teach others the knowledge of the Draags. He shares this technology with other Oms, causing the Oms to become a rival with the Draags as intelligent beings on the planet. The Draags attempt to annihilate the Oms but when the Oms start showing capability to fight back, both sides are forced to compromise and live together (link wikipedias synopsis). Because the animation consisted of so many metaphors and surreal imagery, there has been debate about the meaning behind the story. America, for a time, believed that it was a commentary on their involvement in Vietnam. However, given the time it was released, the animation was likely a commentary on the Cold War, a message that war and destruction could be avoided as long as the leaders of the countries really wanted it. Fantastic Planet analyzes the nature of humans as a species with a constant referral to our animalistic traits. Terr is a human who has had minimal contact with other humans until he escaped his owners. However, as a child, he is given knowledge by his owner, Tiva, and shows the curiosity of human nature and the desire to learn more. However, in his first contact with other tame Oms, his immediate response was to attack him. The wild Oms that Terr later meets have learned to quickly adapt to their environments, creating small civilizations with leadership and sustainability. However, when Terr intrudes with new advancements for their colony, the wizard, the wisest of the group, forces Terr to prove himself in a battle to the death. Even the Draags are a commentary on humanity. Despite their higher intelligence, they treat Oms with a very base and savage manner which was visible in the first scene of the movie where Terrs mother is killed by Draag children toying with her fragility. Each group of characters shows us the animalistic nature of the human mind, but also the ability to overcome this with our conscious choices. While Europe and the US had its acclaimed pieces of animation involving psychology, it did not expand further than a few independent pieces. However, back in Japan, the use of psychology within animation continued to expand. After World War II, Japan was quickly modernized by the US. This change caused a sharp division between life in the 1950s and life from 1990s and onwards. Even now, in the technology boom, Japan continues to constantly push forward in social development. Animations have reflected this change in society and its effects on the individual. Chiaki J. Konaka, writer of Ghosts in the Shell which later became an anime series and movie, writes about the loss of identity and sense of reality within her works. The movie Ghost in the Shell (1995), directed by Mamoru Oshii, is a police thriller set in a technology-based, cyberpunk world. Motoko Kusanagi, the protagonist, is a member of a special group of armed forces entitled the Japanese National Public Safety Commission, Section 9. Her purpose is to fight technology-related crime. Kusanagi herself, is a mechanically altered human with most of her body parts artificially made. Only her brain and a segment of her spinal cord remain organic. With the development of artificial intelligence, there is very little difference between Kusanagi and a robot. This makes her question her existence and her identity as a human. The word Ghosts refers to the presence of the human soul or consciousness of existence, but how one determines their own existence is uncertain and becomes the underlying conflict for Kusanagi. Konakas works look at the merging of humans with technology in order to question our personal identity and understanding of existence. Serial Experiments LAIN (1998), an anime series written by Konaka and directed by Ryutaro Nakamura, is a 13-episode anime series where Lain Iwakura discovers the world of the Wired, which is a communications network similar to the Internet except that communication within it can occur on the unconscious level as well. In LAIN, the plot is based on the idea that all existence comes from human thought. We exist through our memories of each other and, in the Wired, thoughts can manifest themselves in reality through hallucination, thus making the boundary between reality and this cyber world blur. Lains identity is questioned first when she receives an email from her recently deceased friend, Chiaki, saying that she did not actually die but simply abandoned the flesh and is now living in the Wired. This led Lain on a journey to find out what happened to Chiaki. In the process, we are shown episode after episode dealing with the definition of reality. Based on the idea that existence comes through memory, in the end, Lain erases the memory of herself from everyones minds. Because of the control she gained in the Wired, Lain realized she had absolute control over everyones minds and reality itself and feared what she would be capable of. She feared the ability to control human thought so chose to disappear. LAIN has been the subject of several academic articles regarding philosophy and our perspective of reality. It claims the mind is the center of all existence and therefore delves into it and its place in reality in 13 layers (as the episodes are called). LAIN discusses a much more philosophical side of psychology. Probably the most famous of animators dealing in psychological stories is Satoshi Kon. He is particularly known for his animated films where the borders between dream and reality are blurred. Identity is a common theme in his works and allows for psychological reflection of his characters. His first directed film, Perfect Blue (1997), was a psychological thriller about a pop singer and her transition into film and television. Mima, the main character, a former member of the pop band, CHAM, leaves in order to pursue her career as an actress. She gets her big break in a straight-to-video drama series when the writer gives her a larger part as a woman who is raped in a strip club. However, the role is a large trauma to her and her followers, being such a large diversion from her identity as an innocent pop singer of CHAM. Soon, Mima starts to lose consciousness of reality and illusion, forgetting events that had happened and losing her awareness of passing time. The character she portrays and the person she is outside of the drama merge together in her mind. Meanwhile, there is another person impersonating her online, claiming Mima to be a false image and that the online one is real. Given Mimas state, she almost believes this to be true and wonders how she cant remember writing these things. One of Mimas fans, Me-Mania, also believes the internet impersonator and attempts to kill Mima, believing that he was destroying the falsehood for the real one. Rema, Mimas agent, turns out to be the impersonator, not wanting Mimas old image to die. She attempted to destroy the falsity that Mima had become and maintain the Mima of the past pop-singer days. Perfect Blue toys with the idea of identity in how others picture a person and how that person identify herself. Millennium Actress (2001) was Satoshi Kons next movie dealing with personal identity. In this film, Chiyoko, a retired movie actress, tells the story of her life to Tachibana, a director working on a documentary of his idol actress. Chiyokos life story starts with her hiding a government rebel from the military when she was fourteen years old. When the military finds he had been hiding in her store house, he flees, but accidentally leaves behind a key, which Chiyoko is determined to return to him. She enters the life of an actress in order to travel for her search. The rest of her life she tells through the movies she has been in, each role portraying her on-going quest to find this man. The identical quest helps the flow of the transition as Chiyoko identifies herself as each character, changing setting and time, even traveling to different eras. Tachibana follows along and even becomes part of her dream plays, although his cameraman filming the interview keeps a leveled distance from the events. As a film within a film, Kon draws the viewer into his movie in the same way that Chiyoko draws Tachibana into her fantasy life-story. To Chiyoko, she was her characters. She was a princess, an astronaut, and a ninja, all of it becoming part of her life as she twisted each role into a chase for a man. In the end, as she laid dying in a hospital bed, she admits that she knew that the guy probably died and that it was the chase she liked the most after all. She identified herself in the chase and the adventure it held. Paprika (2006), Satoshi Kons most recent film, surrounds the creation of the DC mini, a device that allows psychologists to view a persons dreams and study their unconscious thoughts. Doctor Atsuko Chiba, the protagonist, uses the device illegally to help patients outside the research facility because its use had not yet been officially sanctioned by authorities. She explores the dreams of Detective Konakawa Toshimi using her alter ego, Paprika, who possesses a completely opposite personality to Chiba. However, three of the DC Minis are stolen and the culprit uses it in an attempt to rule over the dream world. But in doing so, he affects reality and the worlds begin to merge. Chiba meets her alter ego in person as a separate entity and only at the end when she comes to terms with this side of her by confessing her love to the awkward Tokita do the persons Chiba and Paprika merge and stop the chaos by consuming it into one being. Paprika explores the chaos of the subconscious and the images we have of ourselves within our dreams. Paranoia Agent (2004) is a 13-episode anime series that explores peoples escape into social and personal identities. In the series plot, Tsukiko Sagi, a famous character designer, was knocked unconscious by a boy with golden roller blades and a bent golden bat. This initial attack leads to subsequent ones and a detective chase by the two officers, Detective Keiichi Ikari and Detective Mitsuhiro Manwa. As the investigation continues, more people are falling unconscious or dead because of Shounen Bat and he becomes the talk of the town. What is peculiar is that each of his victims were already trapped in a corner and had been relieved he had hit them. Finally in the end, we learn that Tsukiko, just like her famous dog character Maromi, created the image of Shounen Bat in order to escape a problem in her life. Paranoia Agent explores several of the different subcultures of Japan in order to explore the ways in which the Japanese identify themselves as a people. It ranges from the isolated otaku who spends his time making anime dolls to the perverted old man who frequents the sex trafficking circles to the general public and its obsession with the latest trend character, Maromi. Paranoia Agent explores the period of time within the mind when its means of escape starts to take over its perception of reality. Japan is leading the way of psychology within animation as more animators begin to explore this territory. Chris Landreth is a modern Oscar-winning animator dealing with psycho-realism, the use of realistic movement in abstract scenes to look into a characters mind. His most famous work is his 2004 short film, Ryan, a look into the disintegrating mind of a famous animator, Ryan Larkin. Bingo (1998), another of his shorts, looks at the deteriorating will of a person under psychological attack by clowns. Cat Soup (2001), directed by Tatsuo Sato, is an oddly cute animated short about a brother and sister cats search for half of the sisters soul. It uses abstract narrative as the characters go on a bizarre journey into a surreal dream world. With animation as a strategic medium for abstract and iconic representation of intangible ideas, modern days are showing increased interest in the human mind as the topic of the animated narrative. . "/?   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