Talk:SITA SINGS THE BLUES
From mediaartiststudio
FILM DISCUSSION
Sean Parker says: It seems that from some of the discussion I heard immediately after the film ended the majority opinion of the movie was quite positive. I thought that by no means was it a bad film, but Sita Sings the Blues disappointed me in many ways.
One of the main criticisms I heard of was the overabundance of song segments, and I must agree that they could have been edited down both in length and quantity. Between the two primary art styles of the Sita story, a number of such sequences seemed redundant, as more than once the story would repeat what just happened in the form of a song without adding enough new to make it worthwhile... as the great Peter Randlette once said, "If it's done once, it's beautiful. If it has to be done twice, give it reason and enough change to make it worthy of being appreciated again." With such moments back-to-back with little purpose aside from adding more music, I couldn't find the reasoning behind it.
However, I thought this was a small problem in comparison to it's approach to comedy. Some of it worked, and I liked the idea of the three shadow puppet interpreters who argued the facts and basically showed how implausible and ridiculous some of the story was, and the self-reflexivity was a strong breath of fresh air... but it was done too much. The opening joke of the movie, as the blues music is interrupted by the archaic record playing skipping, and skipping, and skipping, seemingly endlessly, as nothing else really happened, set the precedent for nearly all of the humor to follow. Which is to say, sadly unoriginal, and far, far, far too drawn out and repetitive. I was disappointed that the creative and often really visually stylistic approach to the story didn't match with the bland comedy. I felt that director Nina Paley could've put more thought into making the humor more dynamic, such as the concept of comedic riffing, where something subtlety builds up into a sequence of jokes, progressing to a hilarious close, as well as the comedic "rule of three." Many of the jokes had little to no variation as they were repeated, and were done far too many times! I felt a little insulted the eighth time that the film wanted me to laugh at the villain monotonously screaming at Sita's defiance -- that was only one of numerous such occurrences that bothered me. Aside from the repetitive gags, I found it easy to predict where any joke was heading. I hoped and prayed that the film would have the decency to NOT throw in the record scratch sound effect after Sita's attempt at a romantic run-into-the-arms moment with her lover that failed, but when it did, I rolled my eyes and felt like the director was too content with the interesting premise to try hard at being creative with humor.
Far and away, I felt that the film was at its best when it wasn't trying to be funny, which was just often enough so that I was engaged. The animation and music in the opening credits were really cool, and the rotoscoped dance sequence was incredibly well done! I also thought that while the real world storyline and the Sita storyline didn't really share as much in common as the film seemed to think, it was an interesting approach that added a nice personal touch to the piece, and when the film ended I realized that it was a perfectly sensible choice.
One other thing that bothered me in the movie was also one of its strengths, just taken a bit too far. During the musical numbers, I noticed a tremendous amount of synced material. Once I started paying attention to it, I realized that quite literally, almost every animated movement was set precisely to the music. I'm a big proponent of integrating soundtracks with visuals, but I really prefer it when it's done with a dose of subtlety. It really was impressive from a logistics point of view, but it got old very fast, with almost every character lurching about on the same animated loop with a dull start-STOP start-STOP rhythm. It felt to me that the visuals were completely enslaved to the music. I think this is another reason why the songs should have been shortened. The repetitive movement combined with a lack of trimming down unnecessary bits made the film drag too much for me. How about that seemingly 30+ second looping shot of the monkey slowly sidestepping to the beat across the entire screen... only to slowly sidestep all the way back again? Only if the shot were branded with a label stating "Sorry, this is filler because frankly, we're out of ideas for what to put in these instrumental breaks" could it have been more apparent to me.
Overall, I thought the film had more going for it than against it. It was actually an okay movie to me, I just felt it stopped way short of being an original, memorable take on the classic story that it could've been, and that's why I'm being so harsh. It had great potential but certain aspects, in particular the comedy, irritated me to no end. -- Sean Parker
I found Sita Sings the Blues to be quite inspirational. I truly loved the level of work and detail that was put into this cartoon. I especially loved the use of polarities during the transendant pieces. I am also a huge fan of old-timey swing/blues songs that really put a classic spin on this highly modern, independant asthetic. The cartoon was separated by 4 animation styles: 1) handrawn, comic style that portrayed a modern relationship turning to heartbreak. 2) Very stylish and still archytypal/symbolic imagery to open and close the piece along with after the intermission break that included rotoscoping and video, I found these sequences to be my favorite as they involved a relaxing, meditative element. 3) cut-out, traditional style with bouncing, non-flexible characters that were pictures probably scanned from real illustrations. 4) Modern animation - the dark outlined digital style found in most cartoons these days on Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network (i.e. Fairly Odd Parents, Powerpuff Girls) to accompany the music segments. All styles supposedly done in Flash, which is hard for me to believe, but know it is possible if done correctly. At times the piece might have been a bit too cutesy for my taste, but is no drawback from it's historic relevancy. Some people may see the cartoon as a elaborate love-story. But I see it as a story of one person's sacrifice and true struggle through life to an enlightened transcendance to the infinite wonders in the afterlife. - - - -Sean Downey
On behalf of Sita Sings the Blues I found myself immediately engaged by the whimsical introduction, dynamic score and variation in animation styles. I particularly liked the narration between the three silhouetted characters with wacky teeth. Their casual story telling manner felt like an unedited interview, telling a well known story between three friends. Although I could critique that there was an over usage of certain segments, such as Sita singing the blues, the question of audience occurred to me. While the repetition may not cater to a (young) adult attention span, it may appeal to the interest of a younger audience. As I am paying attention to structure, quality and overall cinematic themes, a younger audience would perhaps remember/further enjoy the story and characters through the music and repetition of songs. After all, for whom are cartoons generally made? The intermixed segments between the modern day couple going through a break up left me hanging in the end. Although I saw the parallels of the female characters getting dumped and heartbroken, in the end Sita proved to be faithful as she was swallowed back into the earth, while lady of modern sensibilities... read a book? It bothered me even more that she left her stripped cat in her old apartment and justified it with the replacement of a black cat. -Jahla, Nov. 16, 2008
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The words of Nick Marchlewski read as such:
Sita Sings the Blues or does she? A film, nay movie taking an old story and blaspheming it all over the place in a charming and delightful way—is there anything better than that? The humor was hit or miss, but always appreciated. The biggest fall was the comedic timing (for example, the shocking music that focuses on Ravana, as Sita one ups him, should have ended after the third time). People seem to love the artful dancing (perhaps rotoscoping) sessions that had lots of colors and delight, however, I feel this took more from the film than it gave. It was too long and irrelevant. The other sequence which was a bit problematic, for a potential buyer of the film, is the intermission. Imagine finally owning a copy of this fine piece of art, but every time you watch it, there’s a very long (at least seemingly long) intermission you have to sit through—this is where Monty Python did it right (a reference to Monty Python and the Holy Grail’s keenly placed and timed intermission sequence). Oh, dare I mention that the low resolution (resulting in huge pixels) was a bit distracting, but this film would look great on any TV set.
However, this movie did not bore me. I was entertained till the end. Sure the songs could have been a bit shorter, and there could have been a few adjustments (namely the lot that I mentioned above), however, I am satisfied-ish.
Nick Marchlewski out.
Sita Sings the Blues was an amazingly inspired and creative feat of animation genius...visually. I felt, however, that it was much to repetitious and predictable to warrant a two thumbs-up rating. Aside from the same jokes over and over again, there's nothing that irritates me more than old-timey music, which I could have handled if it wasn't for that fact that a vaudeville number was being belted out exactly every two minutes. At first, I found the Greek chorus to be charming and an interesting way to narrate the story, but then I realized that I had seen this exact set-up, delivery and punch-line somewhere else. The chorus' dialogue seemed to play out like a table reading for a Dr. Katz episode. I found the visual jokes to be a much more effective and humorous than almost all of the other comedic elements instilled into the piece. I like how Nina Paley cut up the main storyline with her own seemingly related experience, but these scenes were just too short depriving them of any kind of value. It seemed like a quick skit thrown in rather than an integral part of the movie. Aside from Sita's downfalls, the movie was quite impressive from an animators point of view. Completing an 82 minute flash animation, with all of the audio, backgrounds, characters jumping around and everything else from one person is impressive. The rotoscoped scene was amazing, quite a psychedelic experience. If only the entire movie could have been that original.
Ryan
What I appreciated most about this movie was it's unique approach to storytelling. The use of the chorus as three people having a casual conversation explaining this legend to us let the audience take a step back from the actual legend of Sita and Rama. Our storytellers argue about details, banter about the plot holes in the story and try to interpret the story. This makes us do more than just listen to the story for entertainment, it makes us think about the cultural relevance of the legend and the way people relate to it. The correlation between Sita's tale and Nina Paley's experiance with moving to india is the overall point to this movie and it feels very profound when you consider that she probably learned of this legend while she was going through this whole ordeal, and she makes sure we understand that relating to this story is what eventually got her through the break-up. So although I'll agree with the class in that the repetative musical segments got old, the movie was very successful in it's goal of bringing this old Hindu legend into a modern context through her own experience.
-Matt Olson
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This movie was both a surprise and a disappointment. Surprisingly, I enjoyed it quite a bit for a feature length animated film, of which I am normally not such a fan. The varying looks for Sita, Rama and the rest added enough variety as to keep it visually appealing, with the Greek chorus deserving a special mention for their completely contrasting look. Technically, the movie was downright flawless, as Paley jumped seamlessly from one animation style to the next. Thematically, the varying animation looks seemed to support the idea that Sita's story is a very relatable, universal one -- we have at all time or another experienced heartbreak, and many of us have more specifially endured the pain of being wrongly dumped despite our devotion and loyalty. The concept and look intertwined in a very effective, lovely way. The rotoscope segment following the intermission was particularly delightful.
On the other hand, like Sean Parker, I agree that the musical numbers went from novelty to monotony in a very short time span. There was a sense that at some point Paley felt obligated to stretch a relatively simple, short story into a feature length film, and so opted to fill in the blanks with torch songs. As our class motto says, "less is more", and at least in the context of this film, the musical numbers may have been more effective had they not come in such mass quantities. I found myself dreading the songs toward the end of the film and hoping for more dialogue. The film may have done better at a shorter length with less songs, especially given that since Sita's point of view didn't really change much thru the story, the songs themselves became redundant and repetitive.
- Chandra Farnsworth
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I thought (although controversial) the best aspect of this film was the narration between the three silhouetted characters. I know that this was scripted, but it gave the feeling of some woman traveling to India and being told a popular story by locals, in a very casual way. I thought the bickering and the stream of conscious animation that accompanied it was delightful. I especially enjoyed when the characters were critical of the story, for example when one of the characters went on and on about why Sita didn't return with the monkey, but instead made Rama come and get her. It reminded me of a pointless argument I would have with my friends. I thought it was a commentary on how timeless and well known this story is in India, like you could go up to any random three people and they could recite the story together, just as portrayed in this film. As everyone has already said the musical segments were over done. I also just didn't like the style at all. Every other animation style seemed to attempt to be done in a way that reflected Indian art, which was greatly appreciated. But the singing animation fell far from that. I also felt that blues singing is very western and it was a weird way to tell an Indian story. I understood that the director was trying to draw connections to prove how this struggle exists across all culture differences, but I thought that point was made clear with the autobiographical animation that accompanied the story of Sita. I would have like to have seen more of the personal story also, it was very intriguing. It would have been nice if any character in this story had been more dynamic, which is something that seemed to have fallen short. I think the director had the opportunity to make the lady (who I believe was a reflection on herself) to be extremely more interesting and deep. It was definitely a technical feet and was beautifully done.
Tasha 12:24pm November 17th 2008
Overall, I would have to agree for the most part, with the other posts about Sita Sings the Blues. It had many wonderful moments, with its amusing and very well crafted animations, as well as incredibly funny dialogue delivered by the tales three narrators. It quickly however, lost its charms with an overbearing amount of 1920's song and dance numbers. Now I know this is supposed to be Sita singing her blues, but it caused a digression in plot, that barely made the tale watchable. Song and dance numbers aside though, it was quite an amazing movie. The short hybrid rotoscoping directly following the intermission was one of the most pleasing animated sequences i've witnessed in a long time. I just wished there was more content dealing with the actual story in the Ramayana. The parallel plot was also a little less interesting, though pertinent. I didn't feel like it meshed all that well, but it did create a few "well that's sad" moments. Sita sang the blues...but not everyone wanted to listen.
- James Kupihea
I agree with the majority that has been spread across this page. As an overall piece it was whimsical and inspiring for what can be created in the realm of computer animation. The use of motion reminded me of a 2-D animation rather than a computer generated ones, also recalling the brilliant creations of Lotte Reiniger. I thought the use of songs set an easy breezy tone for the film which amidst some of the sorrow and cause for pain kept it more in the genre of Disney animation than avant garde cinematic wonder. I appreciate that Sean quoted Peters rule of thumb as I do believe that much as i liked the songs, they could have been changed up to keep my interest intact. That being said i am still in shock and awe that one person created this, and that is something to be inspired by.
-Michaela snowMassara
The film’s reflexivity caused the viewer to think about what they were viewing as they were viewing it, and allowed for more awareness. The three commentator characters offered a nice comic relief, and the idea of an intermission in the middle struck me as clever and original. Perhaps this reflexivity occurred too much, though, as it distracted the viewer from better absorbing the story.
The blues sequences did not bore me—I think I may be the only one! It reminded me of getting dumped and listening Eliott Smith, or something of that nature, over and over, to get over someone. So in my opinion, the repetition made sense, and the dancing animals were amusing. However, Sita’s figure, more specifically her giant breasts and tiny waist, bothered me a bit. It distracted me. Other than this minor complaint, the art design blew me away. The dance sequence following Nina’s heartbreak stood out due to its different style, and was effective in conveying a strong emotion. Its uniqueness came at an appropriate time to spice things up, and move the story along.
Sita Sings the Blues used several beautiful animation styles to weave two stories together pretty successfully. India and blues singing do not pair up normally in my mind, but it worked. I enjoyed the film quite a bit, and I'm glad I saw it.
-Lauren
Maybe it was just that I came to the theater really wanting to like Sita Sings the Blues (both because as an animator it was a feature length animation, and because I'd been disappointed with many of the films at the festival), but I left the film feeling really positive about it with few complaints, not to mention inspired. However, reading my classmates reviews, I do relate to many of their qualms with it (mostly that it's a bit repetitious, but I didn't really mind). I think it's an impressive piece of art, and that it is very accessible. I especially liked the use of contrasting animation styles, both because it was visually pleasing and because when I'm animating, boredom and carpal-tunnel can both be problems and it's fun to switch it up, so it's nice to see it work well.
Also, I agree with Lauren that Sita's shapely figure in the musical segments was ever-present and had I been animating this film, I would've made her body shape a bit more realistic. However, I think the silhouette may have been a tribute to an earlier animation style (she looks similar to Betty Boop). Also, her exaggerated curvy figure is consistent with Sita's excessive "feminine" personality traits, which are poked fun at throughout the story. In the original story, I assume she is portrayed as the ideal ancient Indian woman and wife but the film acknowledges the absurdity of her devotion. Luckily, in our modern society, most of us know that once your husband leaves you pregnant and in the woods, it's time to move on, and it's unacceptable to allow your kids to sing their father's praises because you'd hope they'd have better role models than an abusive chauvinist. Also, the men were equally excessively masculine and their heroism was definitely overdone for an ironic effect (like when Sita and Rama are un-phased as they sing, surrounded by all of the bodies in forest in the opening musical scene). If this animation were aimed at children, I might object more, but I don't think children are the target audience, or that they would particularly like this film (especially because of the contemporary plot, which would be difficult for children to relate to). --Celena
Sita Sings the Blues was a feature length flash animation that retold a break-up story of ancient Indian folklore and re-contextualized it within a contemporary personal narrative. The story of the prince Rana, and his shunning of his faithful and beautiful wife Sita, was engaging, musical, and colorful; but I found the animator’s personal story of loss to be disconnected from the rest of the piece. I think that this is in part because her personal break-up was referenced less frequently, the animation style was drab and less appealing, and because it was hard to see a connection between the main character and those in the ancient Indian folklore tales. The only obvious connection is that the main character’s boyfriend left her for a job in India, but that seems to be a weak reason for her to seek out an Indian tradition to help her grieve. I would’ve liked for this character’s story to have been developed further, and I kept hoping for some sort of resolution between the two stories. I enjoyed the different interpretations of Rana’s story and of the Indian characters themselves. The vibrant colors and variation in the animation style of these stories kept it fresh, and also allowed for the audience to see how stories change and grow with each retelling. There were numerous segments were the heartbroken wife character, animated with large eyes and an ample bosom, broke into song, which is characteristic of Bollywood style films. She sang American blues songs from the 1920s, and while this was cute at first it quickly became redundant as each song had little variation to offer. Her character also offered a contemporary feminist critique of the way women have been treated historically, and what their roles have been in relation to men. Both Sita and the main female character were abandoned by the men in their life once more profitable situations arose. I don’t know what was more heartbreaking, the betrayal of of these women by the men they were devoted to, or the fact that they were unable to move on with their lives once they were given freedom. -Jaden Maher
Sita Sings the Blues.
I don’t understand what all the fuss is about. I found the aesthetic of the animation to be very gratuitous—as if the software was more visible than the animation itself. Along with the harsh flash images, the music was generally annoying and out of place. I love old time music, but not coupled with psychedelic visuals. That being said, I’m not an animator, thus I don’t want to completely shut down the film. I admit, I did love the element of storytelling—especially the bantering that was done by the silhouetted characters. Their casual squabbles about the plot enabled for an “out loud” analysis of the connection between the legend of Sita and Nina Paley’s personal story. Overall, I can’t say that I hated the film. I have to give Nina Paley some credit for constructing an 82 minute animation all by herself. However, I don’t think I want to hear Sita sing the blues again…
-Jana Bolotin
To be honest, I was skeptical coming in to see Sita Sings The Blues. After the previous night's flick, "Mock Up on MU," I was expecting a film that would leave me unsatisfied. Well, rather, this was my bleak outlook until I actually saw a preview on YouTube for the film. Needless to say, I was hooked, and I couldn't have been more excited to see the film. I'm a sucker for animated films, and to think that I would be seeing a cartoon instead of some pretentious two-hour film with a girl running through a forest, was indeed a huge relief.
Sita Sings The Blues has been out for a couple of years, and I wish I had found out about this movie sooner. Brilliantly animated in Flash, Sita has an excellent mash-up of olden' singing, humor, and detailed animation set to Bhangra music. The opening had me hooked, and wishing I could find a version of the song to buy. It was a clever rendition of the Ramayana, and the animation interested me enough to want to pursue actually reading the book, rather than just watching the gist of it through a cartoon.
The only real problem I had with the film, was the amount of music used. Rather, the music that wasn't specifically Bhangara. Don't get me wrong, I am a huge fan of lounge/jazz singers like Ella, Billie, and the like. Annette Hanshaw is also a favorite of mine, yet I found the amount of her songs used was a little too much. Rather, I would have enjoyed seeing more plot, or use of the shadow puppets than her singing in her 'Betty Boop' esc satire of the Ramayana. Not to forget the quality of the video sometimes distracted me from the film. There was one scene where the movie became pixelated, and I was unsure if that was the actual film, or just the quality of the video. Still, I was able to overlook it since the movie was able to deter me enough from simple rendering issues.
I very much liked the film, amount of singing aside, it would be something I would consider buying on DVD.
-Kamaria Daniel
