TAKU BODA (タクボーダ/Nice to See You Re-Mix, 2009)

 One of Taku Furukawa’s most admirable qualities is his enthusiasmfor playing with technologies both old and new. His Annecy Special Jury Award-winning film Phenakistiscope (1975)brought the 19^th century optical amusement into the 20^thcentury and he was one of the first alternative animators to experiment with computeranimation with his films Mac the Movie (1985) and Play Jazz (1987).

TAKU BODA (タクボーダ/Nice to See You Re-Mix, 2009) combines the animation genius of Taku Furukawa with thetechnical wizardry of video game producer and CG animator Noriyuki Boda.  It is a remake of Nice To See You (1975), awonderful little abstract film that Furukawa made on 16mm.   TAKUBODA starts and ends with the original film which was almost monochrome – justblack and green – and had no soundtrack. The re-mix flips the original film on its head by injecting colour,lively music, and three dimensional CG movement.  The shapes and movement of the original filmare placed onto the sides of cubes which roll across a grey on white grid.  The animation is as visually engaging as the accompanyingmusic, with lots of variety of patterns and shape size. 

Nice To See You conveyed a message about how we interpret images; thatsometimes we need to change our perspective to see the bigger picture.  A similar message is conveyed by TAKU BODA, butwith the added caveat that great art is created not just through exploring theworld from different perspectives, but also from being open to new methods andtools.  There are few films that blendold and new animation practices with such harmony as TAKU BODA.

TAKU BODA appears on Takun Films 2, a new release by AnidoFilms.  The original version of Nice toSee You appears on Takun Films 1.  Doencourage Anido to release more gems of Japanese indie animation by shopping intheir online shop.

Catherine Munroe Hotes 2011