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The experimental film I want to analyze is Balance(1989).

The film’s figurative elements are simple: boards, boxes, fishing rods, people, and the eternal space. They seem to have nothing to do with each other, yet they maintain a delicate balance. The film begins with five people standing on a suspended board. They stand back to back in different directions while the board balances. Presently, one of the men caught a box from under the board. The weight on his side increased, so the other four men went to the other end of the board to balance with him. Then one of the four took a step back, his balance was broken, and the box slid towards him. The next five men began to play for the box. Finally, with a slap in the face, the five men shook hands over the box, upsetting the balance. After some fighting, there was only one man left, facing the box at either end of the slab. He ends up suspended in nothingness, unable to satisfy his desires any longer.

This balanced space is set in a timeless space, and the overall environment is represented by cool colors of blue and gray. There was no warmth in the light. In this space, all “people” have blank faces, dull movements and the same intelligence, the only difference is the number behind them. They are more like “products” of industrial society than “people”. They have no emotion, no speech, no expression, so the sound effect of the whole film can be almost described as dead silence. Only the sound of boards. The elements used by the director mainly focus on a single object in the picture, cold color and dead sound effect, forming this eternal space, emitting eternal nothingness and depression.

The use of elements in the whole film is relatively simple and simple, but the theme and emotion the director wants to express is far more than that. First of all, outward balance does not equal inner balance. People’s hearts are never balanced, they are filled with curiosity, desire, selfishness and other emotions. So in the event of any single stimulus from the outside, it’s out of control. People in desire and greed under the stimulus, step by step to break the balance, conflict. Secondly, it is inevitable that the balance will be broken. People are in the eternal space, there is no ideal and hope, the spiritual world is empty, so it will be easy to be tempted by an old box. Finally, combined with the creative background and historical factors at that time, in 1989, the Eastern European upheaval, the Berlin Wall was about to be torn down. Many of the people inside East Berlin could not bear the oppressive conditions and fled outwards, climbing toward the so-called freedom. When the Berlin Wall was built, according to historical sources, “the barbed wire was slightly to the inside of legal GDR territory to ensure that East Germans who had crossed the wall could be shot.” We can see how oppressive the social background was.

In short, although the film is about “balance”, but also about the lack of “balance”. The theme involves the greed and selfishness of human nature, social order and moral rules, profit distribution and resource integration and so on. The director conveys his deep philosophical views in the form of experimental films.

Stage1:Grey wolves, spiders, sharks, piranhas and snakes form a criminal gang known as the “Bad Guys Alliance”, which can easily get past the police and do all the wrong things. They are triumphant in their stronghold, wanting to be the focus of the news.
Stage2:Mayor Diana Fox provoked them on the news by calling the Bad Guys a pathetic bunch of people. Also, a trophy for the best citizen will be presented to Mr. Guinea Pig. The badass league decided to grab the trophy and prove themselves.
Stage3:The bad guys go out and get the trophy as planned. The Wolf picked up the old woman on the stairs and found himself very interested in being a good person. The bad guys are caught because of the Wolf’s hesitation. The guinea pig stopped the police to give them a chance to turn over a new leaf.
Stage4:Bad alliance into the guinea pig home to learn to be good people, to rescue a house of captive guinea pigs. In these processes, the gray Wolf found his good side and began to want to be good.
Stage5:At the new party, Guinea Pig wants to show off the league of reformed baddies. The bad guys originally planned to steal the treasure, but the Wolf did not start. But the guinea pig masterminded it, stealing the treasure and framing the bad guys.
Stage6:The bad guys are framed and jailed. They blame the wolves and turn against each other. When Diana fox came to break the prison, it turned out that she was a famous thief before. Fox Diana and Wolf turn their enemies into friends and travel together to stop the guinea pig’s plan.
Stage7:The bad guys feel the power of good and come to the aid of the Wolf. But the snake still pretended to be helping the guinea pig. We finally caught up with the charity.
Stage8:The guinea pig was successfully foiled. The bad guys get back together and become heroes.

Hero: wolf
Mentor: Diana Fox
Threshold Guardian: the masses
Herald: cat
Shapeshifter: Diana Fox
Shadow: snake
Trickster: guinea pig
Allies: snake, spider, sharks, piranhas

Timeline:

An alliance of bad guys does bad things. Diana Fox provoked them by the mayor’s speech and vowed to steal the trophy.

The badass league goes for the trophy, but the gray wolves discover their good side, causing them to be exposed. The best citizen guinea pig came out and offered to help them become good people.

The bad Wolf gradually found his good side. The bad guys plan to steal treasure at the charity party, but the gray Wolf did not start. The guinea pig revealed that he was up to something.

The Wolf and the fox managed to bring back the charity money and put the guinea pig in prison. The bad guys are back together.

I want to study the materials and themes of Pixar animated films based on cross-cultural communication and integration.Pixar is very good at drawing from different cultural backgrounds and digging into the core, and their team of creators is from all over the world.They are involved in and understand different cultures. After the selection of topic, the story and characters are packaged and embellished to convey to the audience a view of culture and values, which also plays a certain guiding role.They do not understand other cultures from a one-sided identity and perspective, but are good at digging into the most universal and resonant points in the core of other cultures. However, at the same time, the problem is that such traditions and values handed down from other cultures are far from and even run counter to the traditional values of Western countries and even many eastern countries.Pixar cleverly avoided the contentious points, using emotion as a bond to convey some of the culture’s core core.On the other hand, the Pixar company in the United States will also export a lot of American culture. Examples include individualism and collectivism, heroism and adventure, feminism and so on.
Keywords pixar，cross-cultural，American Values，Animation theme