Ten years ago, Japanese-born director-producer-illustrator Daisuke “Dice” Tsutsumi’s The Dam Keeper was nominated for a Best Animated Short Oscar and received a slew of prizes worldwide. Just two years ago, he and his team at Tonko House were back in the limelight again with their Emmy and Annie-winning work on the acclaimed mini-series Oni: Thunder God’s Tale. This week, his latest effort, Bottle George (a co-production with Dwarf Studio) was one of the lucky 15 projects selected for the Oscar shortlist in the Best Animated Shorts category.
Produced and co-written by Akihiro Nishino (Poupelle of Chimney Town) and Noriko Matsumoto (Hidari, Oni: Thunder God’s Tale), Bottle George is about a young girl and her mischievous cat who have to deal with a troubling family issue while dealing with a strange creature trapped in a bottle. The poignant stop-motion short which offers a subtle metaphor for alcohol addiction, was the result of a pitch from Nishino, a well-known stand-up comedian and author in Japan. “He proposed the original idea as a children’s book to us more than five years ago,” recalls Tsutsumi. “I was fascinated by the story of a human character trapped in a bottle.”
Originally Tonko House, the studio founded by Tsutsumi and Robert Kondo, was tapped to illustrate his story, but the project stalled for a few years as both Akihiro and Tsutsumi became busy with other ventures. “After I finished Oni: Thunder God’s Tale, I went back to Akihiro and asked if he’d be interested in turning this project into a short film,” recalls the director. “I thought this idea of a man stuck in the bottle of alcohol could dig deeper. I also proposed that this story would be great to be created in stop-motion animation, the medium I personally always had dreamed to be part of.”
The Sincerity Principle
Once the project became solidified as a short, Tsutsumi and his team spent about a year building a story reel. Then, once production started, the animation shoot took about two months. The team used Dragonframe to bring the project to stop-motion life. “We tried real hard to bring ‘life; to our characters and I challenged our incredible animators with natural acting that conveys human sincerity,” the director points out. “I was very impressed with our animators who went out of their way to bring their own soul into their characters.”
The toughest aspect of the project was fine-tuning the ending of the story due to its sensitive theme. As Tsutsumi explains, “We kept going back to why we wanted to tell this story in the first place. Also, in terms of the animation challenges, stop motion water was a very challenging thing to pull off technically. I think animators at Dwarf Studio [Monsters at Work, Miraculous: The Movie] did amazing work on this short. I am just so grateful that this is an independent project with no motivation other than our passion to collaborate with this team and share this rather sensitive story topic.
Tsutsumi, who worked on Blue Sky’s Ice Age, Robots and Horton Hears a Who! as visual development artist and on Pixar’s Toy Story 3 and Monsters University as color and lighting art director, believes that good filmmaking allows for inspiring conversations with the audience. “Our intent in the story of Bottle George was to provide no answer to the problems/issues in the story but to share things we all deal with in our lives and have a conversation,” he notes. “If the audience empathized with our characters in any way, that’d be so rewarding for us.”
When it comes to offering advice to fledgling animation directors, Tsutsumi offers this helpful suggestion: “Don’t wait for someone else to give you the opportunity!” he says. No one needs permission to make films. The best way to get better is always by doing it!”
For more info, visit bottlegeorge.com.
