I had the privilege of attending the first short block at RIFF this past Saturday. While each of the four shorts were unique in their own way, the one that really stood out to me was Astronomer's Sun. The first thing I liked about it was the fact that it was claymation. I'm personally sucker for claymation, seeing as it was a major form of animation for children's films during my early years (in fact, the first claymation film I watched was "Santa Clause is Coming to Town"). This particular shortwas very reminiscent of works by Tim Burton. The setting is grim and tense- a deserted land atop a peak during a approaching storm. however, there is the lighter side of the film that uses rainbow colors.
Secondly, I really loved the plot of the short, a astronomer with his loyal wind up bear, sacrifices himself to save not only his bear, but the world from an incoming meteor. he does this by using his life force to power a machine which redirects the meteor from Earth. In the end, we discover that the meteor is actually the soul of his late father that was coming for his son. The real tear jerker is when the teddy bear removes the wind up key and throws it away, which means he'll inevitably stop moving,so that he can in a way join both his owner and his father.
Astronomer's Sun was a mature short that definitely caught me by surprise, i highly recommend it to everyone.
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