Stop Me If You've Heard This One...
Saul Goodman Weaves Conspiracy Tale
A good story is key to any film, no matter how short. In Saul Goodman, filmmaker Jim Connell tells not one, but three stories of political dealings and corruption. The story is emphasized by the computer animation. Rather than pulling the viewer away from the story, the animation minimizes the surrounding world putting the focus on the tale told rather than who is telling the tale.
Written by: Jim Connell
Starring: John Cammarata, Eric Scheiner, Angel Connell, and Paul Connell
Rated
Running time: 27 min.
FilmGuru's Rating : 8 out of 10.
Saul Goodman begins with an old man (voiced by John Cammarata) and a young man (voiced by Eric Scheiner) missing a train. As they wait at the station, the old man works on a crossword puzzle and the two strangers inevitably strike up a conversation. The old man, however, has a strange tale to tell that begins with a hit-and-run on the local news.
The young man, naturally, is incredulous. The story lacks details -- such as the name of the man who interfered in the old man's career. The young man recommends "Saul Goodman" (as in "It's all good, man") as a name for this mysterious figure.
As the story progresses, the old man's tale turns into one of political intrigue. He seems a bit crazy and in desperate need of attention. But the longer the story goes on, the more intrigued the young man appears. Sex, politics, murder, and corporate graft -- the story has it all. But the old timer is still unclear on the details, and he may live to regret them.
When I first saw the trailer for Saul Goodman, I was impressed by the level of animation. Watching the short film, however, the animation immediately disturbed me. I never expected this low-budget work to stand up to the kind of stuff done by the big boys at Pixar or Dreamworks Animation, but the phrase "uncanny valley" kept popping into my mind. The people move in a gangly, unreal way that suggests they are puppets on strings. The facial expressions never seem quite right. They seem posed, unnaturally positioned in relationship to each other and their surroundings. As a result, the characters don't seem truly alive. Nevertheless, the animation is still above average for an independent production.
At first, I couldn't understand why anyone would bother to animate the simple story of an old man and a young man talking. It seemed like more trouble than it was worth. By the time the old man's story got to the third chapter, it became clear that animation was necessary to avoid the impossibly huge special effects that would have been required to visualize the science lab and the fusion laser lab core. The animation had been necessary, and I applaud writer/director Jim Connell for seeing a solution to what otherwise would have been a hugely expensive film.
They key to Saul Goodman is not the animation, but the story itself. Connell merely uses the animation as a means of telling the story. The short film is not about the animation, but about the story. It's gratifying to see filmmakers who focus on the story rather than on the special effects. This is an excellent work and deserves a look.
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