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The Bootleg Files: The Magic Machines

BOOTLEG FILES 872: “The Magic Machines” (Academy Award-winning short film about sculptor Robert Gilbert).

LAST SEEN: On YouTube.

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO: None.

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS: It fell through the cracks.

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE:
Unlikely.

Making a nonfiction film about a visual artist is always a tricky proposition. After all, the finished product is often a work of genius but the process of bringing it to fruition is frequently a tedious process. And truth be told, not every visual artist is a magnetic raconteur or a force of personality.
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Belief (2024)

Premiering at the LA Shorts International Film Festival, “Belief” directed by Christian Loubek is a very good short film about mothers. Christian Loubek’s drama is a great tribute to the big things and little things that our mothers make for us. Whether it’s the big things we see, or small things we don’t see, mothers sacrifice a ton and give up a lot of themselves to ensure enrichment for their children.

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Meeting You, Meeting Me (2024)

Selected to screen at 2024 CAAMFest, Lina Suh constructs what is easily one of the best films of the year. “Meeting You, Meeting Me” is a wonderful chamber piece about two kindred spirits that meet under the most unlikely circumstances. So much of “Meeting You, Meeting Me” is based on whether or not the pair of stars Annika Foster and Sam Yim can spark any kind of chemistry, and lo and behold they have it. “Meeting You , Meeting Me” felt very much in the tradition of masterpieces like “Before Sunset” where circumstances put two people together who didn’t know they needed  they each other.

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Every Bugs Bunny Ever: Homeless Hare (1950)

Homeless Hare (1950)
Directed by Chuck Jones
Written by Michael Maltese
Animation by Ken Harris
Music by Carl Stalling

A lot of Looney Tunes relies on the formula of the whole industrial revolution and the trampling of the environment. While most of it just used as a means of finding a catalyst for a narrative of the short, so many times these shorts always begin with the real bad guy of the piece. Either Bugs, or Daffy are minding their business and are interrupted by some company either destroying their homes, or demolishing some kind of ecosystem. Even shorts like the Coyote and Road Runner finds them primarily battling in man made roads, and train tracks and bridges. They’re rarely hunting each other in the wild, or in bushes, which is an interesting look at how much America was changing in this era.

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