Heart String Marionette

Heart String Marionette is an independent feature-length animated film directed by M dot Strange. It uses 3D animation and CG effects. The film was released online on June 15, 2012. It premiered on March 7, 2015 at the Cinequest Film Festival.^[1]

Plot

Heart String Marionette is a tale about a child trapped in a box, a masked samurai mime, and a stripper who all try to defeat a warlord and an evil clown, who have successfully turned a countryside into a never ending nightmare filled with horrible monsters.

"The narrative of Heart String Marionette does not follow the narrative conventions of traditional films. The narrative style of the film is based on a type of Japanese theater called Noh. One of the premises of Noh as explained by its creator Zeami is that emotion is more important than the ability to lay out a clear cause and effect story. M dot Strange studied the principles of Noh as written by Zeami in creating Heart String Marionette. The film has more similarities with Noh than it does with a mainstream Hollywood film.".^[2]

Voices are provided by Jimmy Urine, JP Anderson, Richard Grove, Asil Aceves, and others.

There are two versions of Heart String Marionette. The Original Cut features original music by composer Endika and was a close collaboration between director and composer.^[3] The Director's Cut is a different version of the film, scored by M dot Strange, that features various scenes that are not in the Original Cut, as well as having some scenes from the Original Cut removed. The Original Cut of the film can be found on M dot's blog in a private YouTube link.

Technical aspects

What is unusual about this film is that it is essentially the work of one person, M dot Strange. Although created using simple techniques compared to many films with computer-generated imagery, (e.g. almost all characters are derived from the same basic figure) this movie has a professional aspect, due in large part to the results obtained through the use of Cinema 4D. The movie contains more than 1,500 shots that were created entirely in Cinema 4D. In addition, After Effects software was used for compositing.^[4] The film took two and half years to complete.^[3] There is a companion book A_Book which highlights the making of the film with a lot of how to tips for DIY animators/filmmakers.^[5]

Release

The film was released digitally online on June 15, 2012.^[6] The Original Cut of the film was screened at the Cinequest Film Festival on March 7, 2015.^[7]

See also

• List of animated feature films
• List of computer-animated films

References

External links

• Official web site
• Companion book, Making of Heart String Marionette ISBN 978-1478171294
• Heart String Marionette at the Internet Movie Database
• Heart String Marionette at Rotten Tomatoes
• Heart String Marionette at Cinequest Film Festival
• Teaser Teaser 2
• Official trailer