Back to the Drawing Board

PlanetFox is BACK IN ACTION with a fun, kinetic entry; truly impressive interactions between animated and human characters.
Top it off with excellent performances, a great sound mix, and sumptuous grading.

WHAT IF… a cartoon came to life…? They can’t so who cares, but this is a very cute and high effort entry that filled the room with smiles and laughs just like in Batman when Jack Nicholson sprays that parade with smile potion

The audience audibly gasped at the characters flying out of the screen. That intrigue was palpable and we are once again blown away at what we are witnessing here. Every year this team delivers something memorable and impressive for a short window. Dabbling in animation feels like such a natural medium for this team, great to see returning talents on screen too, and both leads interacting with animated characters must have been both challenging and rewarding (it really does look like she is holding their hands!) Bravo team.

Well, if you can ride a ridiculously hilarious horse costume all the way to the national finals, there's no limit on where a cartoon space chicken walking a cartoon alien pretending to be a dog might lead you! Without a doubt one of the very best films in Christchurch this year. Both hilarious and technically excellent (except for the one shot where the cartoon figures float off the chairs they're tied to, but it is a 48 hours film!). The agent looking forward to dissecting the cartoon characters was completely unexpected. This one is being shown to the kids as soon as they wake up in the morning!

Planet Fox out here making the most Planet Fox film of all time! Stunning work. You can really see the process from U-Knighted, to Mixed Media, and how the cross over of hand drawn animation to live action in a 48hour film really was inevitable! And what this film may lack in tiny bit of technical polish, it makes up for in CHARM!! The shot of the animated characters coming out of the VHS really sold the whole thing for me! Something about the way the camera moves is so classic, so earnest. This really is made with a pure love of the medium. The contrast between the shot where they are tied to the chair (which HAD to be intentional because its SOOO funny), and the super smooth shots where he is holding the characters is amazing! Great twists, great characters, great ending! It’s everything I ever wanted and more!

I always look out for the animated films because they're my fav medium for any kind of storytelling, and to do this in 48 hours blew my mind. You did a phenomenal job of combining live action and 2D animation. The characters really did feel like they were in the same space, especially when they were grabbed, and when they were yelling through the glass for help. Amazing work under such tight time constraints

napkin burger

This is soooo good.

The character's motivation is introduced so efficiently and without dialogue too!

My mind was genuinely blown when the cartoon characters entered the real world. I hadn't even considered that as a possibility.

And it's executed so well! The interaction feels real! Some feature films fail to do that!
Obviously there are some technical errors which distract (devastating to see, I can't imagine the team's frustration).

I can only come up with one criticism and it's so minor:
I think the agent should have been played by an older actor. Not to bash the performance! It's great!
But the extra sense of authority would have made it feel a bit more like a real world and less like sketch comedy.
Like I say, so minor.

Great use of genre, great use of the elements.
It's all great (except for those 2 or 3 unfortunate errors).

What I liked:
Cute animation and mostly seamless integration with live action. Overall, well filmed and edited as per for Planetfox. Solid acting; I especially enjoyed the performance from the agent. I loved how our would-be animator immediately forced them to act in his cartoon. The V can – nostalgic.

Take it or leave it:
How was it that the kids just happened to be watching the same cartoon at the same time, and if one was on video and they were watching TV, the characters got pulled out of their version? While it finishes on a cute note, the ending is a little flat – I expected an animated fight when they are pulled into the TV. And they end up in the TV version when they got pulled into the video one! Maybe I’m overthinking it.

Final hot air:
Amazing work here, really to do all of this. It’s an enjoyable, creative, and fun short. Great work!

What a triumph – well-deserved crowd favourite in the heat! Just a really enjoyable film to watch. Great idea and great delivery. A real treat to see the surprising moments in this film such as the cartoon characters being yanked out of the smoking VCR and the FBI agent saying what she's going to do with them. The bit where the tied-up cartoon characters float out of their chairs gives this some important 48Hours energy. I don't envy you pulling together all those animations so quickly.

A wannabe animator accidentally frees his inspiration, with cartoonish level results.

The fact that you managed to blend live action and cartoon magic almost seamlessly is just incredible! That moment Fred and Frank fell out from the TV was absolute peak cinema, and their designs and animation style playing off of old Looney Tunes/Hanna-Barbera cartoons felt both nostalgic and fresh! The fact you managed to pull this together in 48hours, fully animated and filmed is an absolute triumph to your skills!
After the joyous absurdity that was The True Story of Billy the Horse last year, this feels like a worthy followup!
Congrats on the shortlisting and I can’t wait to see how far this goes!

The Teletubbies was a great show, I watched it with my sister.

You could have found some Teletubbies costumes? It would have helped sell it for me.

THIS ALIEN HAS GOT A GUN!

Stunning, absolutely stunning. Talking to other teams and audience members of your heat screening, there was a huge amount of confidence that you were gonna take the top spot this year - you should be so proud of the impression you left on everyone! Mad respect for the hustle, and mad respect for getting that mixed media magic coming together that way you wanted to see it!

The escape element of this film is so freaking inspired. Across Aotearoa had a regional award for 'most jaw dropping moment' this year - if that award was in our region, we'd be giving it to you for the way those characters come out of the tape player. Just brilliant.

Now I'm sure you would have liked another hour to tidy up a few things in this, but isn't it fascinating that those hiccups didn't take away from judges scores or audience thoughts! What does that tell us? Say it with me everyone: Story is King! You're another one of the teams that made finals this year despite there being a few glitches that would maybe get scrutinised a bit harder in previous years. Your tale was strong enough to overcome them, and for that we're stoked.

It was quite funny visiting you guys on Sunday. It was clear you hadn't slept, and we were so worried our presence was turning the pressure up unnecessarily. You were all great sports, thank you for giving us that little bit of time to enjoy watching you work on this. And if you want, you can blame us for that shot of the floating characters hahaha.

Conceptually this film was as strong as last years, maybe the dialogue and pacing wasn't quite as polished, but just know you're really on a winning streak here. It's only a matter of time before PlanetFoxFilms is holding the grand final trophy, I know it.

THE BEST THING: A triumphant moment for this team as they continue to refine their craft and deliver the films they want to make under the pressure cooker that this competition is.

THE NEXT THING: I look forward to seeing your stop motion musical next year! :P

Don't want to freak you guys out by how much I gush over your films every year, but you are handily my favourite team in the competition. I leave most years with you as my #1 pick, and this year you are my #1 by some margin! Absolutely blown away by this; I still can't believe you went and pulled it off. The moment they come flying out of the tape?? and the moment he lifts them by the neck?? Just two of the most unbelievable things I have ever seen, I am so obsessed. Baffled that you didn't get more love from the judges! AHH I love this movie!

I think you guys are so cool, and the charm of a PlanetFox short is something I will never get tired of. See you next year can't wait!!!