A Little Film: Oktapodi

I'm just going to take a minute to mention a little animated short that I'm really excited about. I work at Dreamworks Animation, and last year, they brought in ten or so guys from France to be trained for several months before moving to India to head up Dreamworks' studio there as animation supervisors. These little guys (little in age, as well as stature: they were just out of school, having graduated from Gobelins, a very prestigious animation school in Paris) with their backpacks, frequent cigarette breaks, and kisses on both cheeks, were an adorable addition to our campus.

Towards the end of their stint in LA, Dreamworks screened all of these kids' final project films from Gobelins. All of them were impressive, but one stood out. Oktapodi is a madcap 3-minute story about what happens when you separate two octopi in love on a Greek island. It's really wonderful: from the Greek music, to the lovable octopi themselves, the dreamy Mediterranean architecture, to the clever, fast-paced story. It was clear that it was well beyond a simple student film, and now it's nominated for an Oscar! How cool is that?!

Now, it probably won't win. Pixar has a contender in the Best Animated Short Film category, Presto, so there goes that. But, I think it's good to point out: while Presto had all the resources of the most renowned animation studio in the world behind it, Oktapodi was made by just six students. Pretty awesome.

I really liked Presto and a couple of the other nominees as well, but tomorrow I'll be rooting for our boy Julien and the other five, and their two lovelorn octopi.

You can watch the entire film (that's right, all three minutes of it), here.