Last Wednesday, November 19th

 Adam Elliot's new feature length clay animation film, "Mary and Max", is set to be the opening film at the Sundance Film Festival on January 15th.  Adam Elliot's earliest films are included on the Animation Show's Volume 1 collection.  "Mary and Max" is narrated by Barry Humphries, best known as Dame Edna, the film revolves around two unusual pen pals -- a lonely 8-year-old girl named Mary who lives outside Melbourne, Australia, and Max, a 44-year-old obese man residing in New York City. The film is based on the director's own pen pal relationship that lasted over two decades. The voice cast includes Philip Seymour Hoffman and Toni Collete.

Wednesday, November 12th

This weekend the Third Annual San Francisco International Animation Festival kicks off in the Bay Area. This is a great opportunity to catch up with a ton of independent animation that you won’t see anytime soon at a theatre near you. Highlights from the four day fest include: two stellar animated features with Nina Paley’s “Sita Sings the Blues”, Bill Plympton’s “Idiots and Angels”, a best of Annecy 08 and a wicked batch of animated music videos. Opening night is Thursday the 13th and the fest continues through the weekend. Check it out.

Tuesday, November 11th

Dear British Columbia,

I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye but we’re heading back to Vancouver this winter and would love to see you. The Animation Show is coming to the Vancity Theatre November 29th and 30th . So, I hope you’re in town that weekend! And if we’re feelin’ the love we might stay for a few dates in December too… so, we might need your couch and a few beers… No pressure. We’ll clean the bathroom this time. Stay Cool XXOO – Animation Show

Monday, November 10th

Ben Levin and Matt Burnett the duo behind For Tax Reasons is back with their new web series Ronin Dojo Community College DX Mini Saga or just RDCCDX.

During our time away over the last two months we didn’t really devote any time or craziness to the climax of what will go down in history as THE LONGEST FRIGGEN ELECTION EVER. Ben and Matt created a handful of PSA for your viewing pleasure. So feel free to return to you poling place tomorrow and share some happy memories from last week.

Great work guys. Hit up the blogs above for more behind the scenes production work as well.

Friday, November 7th

The latest video from Gnarls Barkley for your Friday. The track is “Mystery Man” from the band’s “Who’s Gonna Save My Soul [EP]”. Happy Friday!

Wednesday, October 15th

So you must ignore the outdated roll over map at the top of our schedule page here and scroll scroll scroll. This week we add Maitland Florida’s Enzian Theater, the fantastic Cinema Du Parc up in Montreal and a return to Memphis via “On Location: Memphis” film group. The good folks of Milwaukee can catch us Friday on screen though at the Times Cinema! Stay tuned as more dates and venues continue to roll in.

Friday, October 10th

For those in need of a daily fix of animation news and discoveries Cartoon Brew has always been one of the best stops on the web. And now there’s a lot more to love as Brewer’s Jerry Beck and Amid Amidi have added a slew of cool new features. First and foremost is Cartoon Brew TV. I’m guessing this is the final evolution of Cartoon Brew Films which kicked off last year. The first four episodes of CBTV are up here and the shorts represent a great mix style and technique. The Brew will be premiering new animation regularly and had this to add in their initial announcement regarding some of the key elements:

"We pay filmmakers. Online animation distribution can’t work unless filmmakers get paid for their efforts. This is something that we regularly preach on the site and we’re delighted that we can now put those words into practice and lead the way as an animation-specific film site and podcast that pays independent filmmakers."

Additionally Cartoon Brew has added some Guest Brewer’s to widen the site’s perspective and enhanced the comments section to spotlight some of the great discussion taking place. Our hats off to Jerry and Amid for expanding the Brew! Keep up the great work guys.

Friday, September 26th

This last summer we toured around the country with director Steve Dildarian’s hilarious short “Angry Unpaid Hooker” and now the show based loosely on his three short films arrives to HBO.

You can hit up HBO’s official site for a grab bag of clips. We caught up with Steve recently online with a terrific interview here as well. This is HBO’s first dip into the animated series pool since Spawn back in the 90’s. Catch “The Life and Times of Tim” starting this Sunday September 28th at 11:00 PM.

The Animation Show is also making big waves this weekend with openings in Iowa City at the Bijou Theater, in Cleveland Ohio at the Cleveland Cinematheque and in Rochester at the George Eastman House. Please come out and say hello!

Check back with our schedule calendar as well as new dates for the fall have been popping up this week.

Thursday, September 18th

Here are a few highlights that have been popping up the last few days and I wanted to share…

David O’Reilly’s Season 3 of PSS

Kristofer Strom of Ljudbilden & Piloten has a new video for the Swedish electronica band Minilogue called “Animals”.

A new Graham Annable short “Don’t Mess with Delaware”

Paul Cummings and Tony Fiandaca of Free Poster Films have a fun new video up for the Gabe Dixon Band “Till You’re Gone”.

Long time show friend David Essman has collaborated with political cartoonist Ted Rall for the first short in a series of new works by the two titled “President Obama’s First Day”.

New “Have a Good Day” animation quickie from Pascal Campion

Thank you to everyone that wrote in with tips!

Thursday, September 11th

Watching animator/performance artist Nieto perform live last year is still easily one of the top highlights I’ve had here during our time at the Animation Show. Mixed in with his reel of shorts during that show were a number of slick ads Nieto had completed over the last few years to pay the bills. We haven’t heard much from the director these past few months and easy to see why. He’s been hard at work on a new short, writing a feature film and distributing a DVD collection of his past work. It turns he was also behind one of the recent Olympic spots that was drilled into our brains back in August.

Paranoid US has posted all of his recent directorial commercial spots here. Nieto’s “Professor Nieto Episode 1” is currently touring in Animation Show 4.