Lyndon Johnson Orders New Pants on the Phone and Requests More Room for His … Johnson (1964)

in Animation, History, Random | November 26th, 2013

“Lyn­don John­son was indeed .… a being of Shake­speare­an dimensions—a hulk­ing, bush-coun­try colos­sus, gar­gan­tu­an of ego and ener­gy, of self-delu­sions and glooms and para­noias, crass cru­el­ties and ram­pant vul­gar­i­ties, but gar­gan­tu­an also in his benev­o­lent ambi­tions.” So begins Mar­shall Frady’s review of Robert Caro’s 2002 polit­i­cal biog­ra­phy, Mas­ter Of The Sen­ate: The Years of Lyn­don John­son. The review then pro­ceeds to describe John­son’s uncouth behav­ior, which some­how always seemed to involve his John­son:

He ear­ly became fabled for a Rabelaisian earth­i­ness, uri­nat­ing in the park­ing lot of the House Office Build­ing as the urge took him; if a col­league came into a Capi­tol bath­room as he was fin­ish­ing at the uri­nal there, he would some­times swing around still hold­ing his mem­ber, which he liked to call “Jum­bo,” hoot­ing once, “Have you ever seen any­thing as big as this?,” and shak­ing it in almost a bran­dish­ing man­ner as he began dis­cours­ing about some pend­ing leg­is­la­tion. At the same time, he would oblige aides to take dic­ta­tion stand­ing in the door of his office bath­room while he went about emp­ty­ing his bow­els, as if in some alpha-male rit­u­al asser­tion of his pri­ma­cy. Even on the floors of the House and Sen­ate, he would extrav­a­gant­ly rum­mage away at his groin, some­times reach­ing his hand through a pock­et and lean­ing with half-lift­ed leg for more thor­ough access.

Above, we have a record­ing of anoth­er col­or­ful episode from the John­son era. On August 9, 1964, the pres­i­dent called the Hag­gar cloth­ing com­pa­ny to order some cus­tom-made pants. It was seem­ing­ly an innocu­ous call, a call you could­n’t imag­ine a pres­i­dent mak­ing today. But it sud­den­ly took a bizarre turn when LBJ asked for more room in the crotch, in the area “where the nuts hang.” That, before let­ting out a short, unapolo­getic belch. It’s clas­sic John­son.

Lis­ten to the famous call play out above, and find a tran­script of the exchange here.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Dizzy Gille­spie Runs for US Pres­i­dent, 1964. Promis­es to Make Miles Davis Head of the CIA

The Exis­ten­tial­ism Files: How the FBI Tar­get­ed Camus, and Then Sartre After the JFK Assas­si­na­tion

Actress Grace Kel­ly Reflects on the Life & Lega­cy of JFK in an Art­ful­ly Ani­mat­ed Video

by | Permalink | Make a Comment ( 3 ) |

Watch Soviet Animations of Winnie the Pooh, Created by the Innovative Animator Fyodor Khitruk

in Animation, Film, K-12 | November 25th, 2013

Note: To acti­vate sub­ti­tles, click the CC icon at the bot­tom of the video.

In 1962, the ani­ma­tor Fyo­dor Khitruk made his direc­to­r­i­al debut with Sto­ry of One Crime, a film that broke with a Sovi­et ten­den­cy to make imi­ta­tions of Dis­ney-style ani­ma­tions. The film, as The Guardian explained in its 2012 obit­u­ary for the ani­ma­tor, came as a shock. It was styl­is­ti­cal­ly sim­ple and dealt with themes that Dis­ney films would nev­er touch — like, why would a polite clerk mur­der two house­wives with a fry­ing pan?

Khitruk made oth­er films that were packed with social com­men­tary, often tak­ing aim at abus­es in the Sovi­et sys­tem. But, he also made straight­for­ward ani­ma­tions for chil­dren, none more famous than his series of films based on AA Mil­ne’s beloved Win­nie the Pooh books.

Cre­at­ed between 1969 and 1972, Khitruk’s three films star a bear named “Vin­ni-Pukh” who looks noth­ing like the Win­nie the Pooh that West­ern­ers grew up with. (You can see the orig­i­nal illus­tra­tions of Pooh by E.H. Shep­ard here.) But view­ers will cer­tain­ly rec­og­nize the sto­ry­line and spir­it of the orig­i­nal Pooh in the Sovi­et adap­ta­tions. For decades, these films have enchant­ed East Euro­pean view­ers, both young and old. And they still occa­sion­al­ly appear on Russ­ian TV.

Part 1

Part 2

Above, you can watch the three ani­ma­tions online. They appear in the order in which they were released: 1) Win­nie-the-Pooh (Винни-Пух, 1969), 2) Win­nie-the-Pooh Goes on a Vis­it (Винни-Пух идет в гости, 1971); and 3) Win­nie-the-Pooh and the Day of Con­cern (Винни-Пух и день забот, 1972).

As not­ed up top, you might need to click the “CC” icon at the bot­tom of the YouTube videos in order to acti­vate the sub­ti­tles. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, we can’t vouch for the accu­ra­cy of the trans­la­tions.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Hear the Clas­sic Win­nie-the-Pooh Read by Author A.A. Milne in 1929

Two Beau­ti­ful­ly-Craft­ed Russ­ian Ani­ma­tions of Chekhov’s Clas­sic Children’s Sto­ry “Kash­tan­ka”

Watch The Amaz­ing 1912 Ani­ma­tion of Stop-Motion Pio­neer Ladis­las Stare­vich, Star­ring Dead Bugs

The Com­plete Wiz­ard of Oz Series, Avail­able as Free eBooks and Free Audio Books

by | Permalink | Make a Comment ( 5 ) |

Filmmaker Michel Gondry Presents an Animated Conversation with Noam Chomsky

in Animation, Film, Philosophy | November 25th, 2013

Even if you reg­u­lar­ly read Open Cul­ture, where we make a point of high­light­ing unusu­al inter­sec­tions of cul­tur­al cur­rents, you prob­a­bly nev­er expect­ed a col­lab­o­ra­tion between the likes of Michel Gondry and Noam Chom­sky. Gondry we’ve known as an imag­i­na­tive film­mak­er behind fea­tures like Eter­nal Sun­shine of the Spot­less Mind and Be Kind Rewind (as well as music videos for artists like Beck, Kanye West, and the White Stripes), one dri­ven to pur­sue a Con­ti­nen­tal whim­sy tem­pered by a ded­i­ca­tion to elab­o­rate, dif­fi­cult-look­ing hand craft and an appar­ent inter­est in Amer­i­can cul­ture.

Chom­sky we’ve known, depend­ing on our inter­ests, as either a not­ed lin­guist or a con­tro­ver­sial writer and speak­er on pol­i­tics, soci­ety, and the media. Gondry’s new doc­u­men­tary Is the Man Who Is Tall Hap­py?, the project that brings them togeth­er at least, show­cas­es both the less-seen pure­ly philo­soph­i­cal side of Chom­sky, and the also rarely acknowl­edged inquis­i­tive, con­ver­sa­tion­al side of Gondry. In the New York Times “Anato­my of a Scene” clip at the top, the direc­tor explains his process.

Nat­u­ral­ly, Gondry went through a fair­ly unusu­al process to make the film, giv­en that he based the whole thing on noth­ing more elab­o­rate than a long-form in-office con­ver­sa­tion with the MIT-based pro­fes­sor and activist. To get the footage he need­ed of Chom­sky talk­ing, he brought in — nat­u­ral­ly — his vin­tage wind-up Bolex 16-mil­lime­ter film cam­era. He then wove those shots in with his also high­ly ana­log hand-drawn ani­ma­tion, which illus­trates Chom­sky’s ideas as he describes them — and as Gondry prods him for more. “The cam­era is very loud,” Gondry explains over a delib­er­ate­ly shaky frame, “and that’s why I have to draw it each time you hear it.” Just above, you can watch the film’s trail­er, which offers Chom­sky’s voice as well as Gondry’s. “Why should we take it to be obvi­ous that if I let go of a ball,” we hear the inter­vie­wee ask, “it goes down and not up?” We also hear the inter­view­er admit that he “felt a bit stu­pid here,” but these two men’s con­sid­er­able dif­fer­ences — in gen­er­a­tion, in nation­al­i­ty, in sen­si­bil­i­ty, in their con­cerns, in the forms of their work — pro­vide all the more rea­son to lis­ten when they talk. And if you find the intel­lec­tu­al trip not to your taste, just behold the visu­al one.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Noam Chom­sky & Michel Fou­cault Debate Human Nature & Pow­er (1971)

Noam Chom­sky vs. William F. Buck­ley, 1969

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture and writes essays on lit­er­a­ture, film, cities, Asia, and aes­thet­ics. He’s at work on a book about Los Ange­les, A Los Ange­les Primer. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

by | Permalink | Make a Comment ( None ) |

Actress Grace Kelly Reflects on the Life & Legacy of JFK in an Artfully Animated Video

in Animation, History | November 21st, 2013

On the eve of the 50th anniver­sary of the John F. Kennedy Assas­si­na­tion, Blank on Blank has released anoth­er one of its dis­tinc­tive ani­mat­ed videos. This one fea­tures Grace Kel­ly, the glam­orous Amer­i­can actress and Princess of Mona­co, con­tem­plat­ing her per­son­al encoun­ters with JFK, the heady days of Camelot, and the lega­cy of Amer­i­ca’s 35th pres­i­dent. When asked whether the pres­i­dent died in vain on that day in Dal­las, she offered these elo­quent words:

Well, it might not seem so today, but I, for one, can­not believe that a man of Mr. Kennedy’s stature and achieve­ments was put upon this earth for no oth­er pur­pose than to stop an assassin’s bul­let, or that the les­son will be whol­ly lost. It is only since the twen­ti­eth cen­tu­ry that the majesty of Abra­ham Lin­coln has been appre­ci­at­ed. I believe that God allows these cer­tain tragedies to hap­pen in order to empha­size the man and his achieve­ments and to inspire those who fol­low to have the strength and the will to accom­plish his unful­filled dreams.

This inter­view was record­ed on June 19, 1965, as part of an oral his­to­ry project designed to pre­serve the mem­o­ry of the late pres­i­dent. The project record­ed inter­views with peo­ple from all walks of life–from bus dri­vers to Leonard Bernstein–but, as David Ger­lach, founder of Blank on Blank explains to us, few peo­ple have heard these record­ings over the years. Now, how­ev­er, a Boston-based radio project has turned them into an hour­long radio doc­u­men­tary called We Knew JFK: Unheard Sto­ries, and it’s avail­able online here.

You can read a tran­script of the Grace Kel­ly inter­view cour­tesy of the John F. Kennedy Pres­i­den­tial Library & Muse­um.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Kurt Von­negut to John F. Kennedy: ‘On Occa­sion, I Write Pret­ty Well’

Watch Janis Joplin’s Final Inter­view Reborn as an Ani­mat­ed Car­toon

Mar­shall McLuhan on the Stu­pid­est Debate in the His­to­ry of Debat­ing (Nixon v JFK)

by | Permalink | Make a Comment ( None ) |

Watch The New America, a Stop Motion Animation Starring 800+ Laser Engraved Wood Blocks

in Animation, Art, Creativity | November 4th, 2013

A Pacif­ic North­west artist becomes infat­u­at­ed with the process of laser engrav­ing wood and hatch­es a plan for a stop motion ani­ma­tion fea­tur­ing hun­dreds of engraved maple blocks that can lat­er be mailed as rewards to his pro­jec­t’s Kick­starter donors.

Fans of the tele­vi­sion show Port­landia may find them­selves expe­ri­enc­ing a false sense of deja vu. Remark­ably, Nan­do Cos­ta is not the inven­tion of come­di­an Fred Armisen. He’s a real per­son, and two years ago, whilst liv­ing in Port­land, he glee­ful­ly embarked on what proved to be a very ambi­tious and time-con­sum­ing project.

The sort of project a guy with his skills and expe­ri­ence could have knocked out in a cou­ple of months had the cho­sen mate­ri­als been mag­ic mark­ers or clay.

Two years and some 800 wood blocks lat­er, The New Amer­i­ca is final­ly avail­able for view­ing, all two min­utes and 37 sec­onds of it. Cos­ta describes the abstract sto­ry­line as “a union between con­cepts and exper­i­ments born dur­ing the Sit­u­a­tion­ist move­ment and real life events expe­ri­enced dur­ing the last few years in Amer­i­can soci­ety. Par­tic­u­lar­ly the dual­i­ty between the eco­nom­ic down­turn and the shift in val­ues and beliefs of many cit­i­zens.”

In oth­er words, it’s unlike­ly to cap­ture the pub­lic’s imag­i­na­tion in the same way as Worst Twerk Fail EVER — Girl Catch­es Fire!

Respond­ing to well wishers—many of whom backed the project on Kickstarter—Costa is gracious…and exhaust­ed.

“It was a lot of hard work and stress,” he tells one admir­er in the com­ments sec­tion of his vimeo chan­nel, adding that more plan­ning would go into any future efforts. Despite his suc­cess­ful Kick­starter cam­paign the project went way over bud­get, and his wife was not thrilled to be shar­ing her home with all those 8 x 4.5 inch maple pan­els. (A few of them are avail­able for pur­chase on etsy, but it’s artist’s choice. Remem­ber what hap­pened when Bart Simp­son stole his dad’s cred­it card to order a gen­uine Itchy and Scratchy ani­ma­tion cel off the Impulse Buy­ing Net­work.)

For now, Cos­ta is con­tent to focus on a new job and set­tling into a new house after a recent move to Seat­tle. After that, per­haps an ani­ma­tion that would involve laser-cut paper, but that, he says, would require research.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

“The Peri­od­ic Table Table” — All The Ele­ments in Hand-Carved Wood

Vin­tage Footage of Picas­so and Jack­son Pol­lock Paint­ing … Through Glass

Watch Cab­bit: A Hand­made Ani­ma­tion by Cross­hatch Artist, Soo­gie

Ayun Hal­l­i­day dreams of ani­mat­ing some­thing or oth­er with dry erase mark­ers one of these days. Fol­low her @AyunHalliday

by | Permalink | Make a Comment ( None ) |

Prize-Winning Animation Lets You Fly Through 17th Century London

in Animation, History | November 1st, 2013

Six stu­dents from De Mont­fort Uni­ver­si­ty have cre­at­ed a stel­lar 3D rep­re­sen­ta­tion of 17th cen­tu­ry Lon­don, as it exist­ed before The Great Fire of 1666. The three-minute video pro­vides a real­is­tic ani­ma­tion of Tudor Lon­don, and par­tic­u­lar­ly a sec­tion called Pud­ding Lane where the fire start­ed. As Lon­don­ist notes, “Although most of the build­ings are con­jec­tur­al, the stu­dents used a real­is­tic street pat­tern [tak­en from his­tor­i­cal maps] and even includ­ed the hang­ing signs of gen­uine inns and busi­ness­es” men­tioned in diaries from the peri­od.

For their efforts, the De Mont­fort team was award­ed first prize in the Off the Map con­test, a com­pe­ti­tion run by The British Library and video game devel­op­ers GameCity and Cry­tek.

Com­ment­ing on the video, one judge from the esteemed British Library had this to say:

Some of these vis­tas would not look at all out of place as spe­cial effects in a Hol­ly­wood stu­dio pro­duc­tion. The haze effect lying over the city is bril­liant, and great atten­tion has been giv­en to key fea­tures of Lon­don Bridge, the wood­en struc­ture of Queen­shithe on the riv­er, even the glit­ter­ing win­dow case­ments. I’m real­ly pleased that the Pud­ding Lane team was able to repur­pose some of the maps from the British Library’s amaz­ing map col­lec­tion – a store­house of vir­tu­al worlds – in such a con­sid­ered way.

You can find more infor­ma­tion about how the ani­ma­tion came togeth­er over at the ani­ma­tors’ blog, plus at The British Library’s Dig­i­tal Schol­ar­ship blog.

Fol­low Open Cul­ture on Face­book and Twit­ter and share intel­li­gent media with your friends. Or bet­ter yet, sign up for our dai­ly email and get a dai­ly dose of Open Cul­ture in your inbox. And if you want to make sure that our posts def­i­nite­ly appear in your Face­book news­feed, just fol­low these sim­ple steps.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

His­to­ry: Free Online Cours­es

Rome Reborn – An Amaz­ing Dig­i­tal Mod­el of Ancient Rome

How the Egypt­ian Pyra­mids Were Built: A New The­o­ry in 3D Ani­ma­tion

A Dig­i­tal Recon­struc­tion of Wash­ing­ton D.C. in 1814

What Ancient Greek Music Sound­ed Like: Hear a Recon­struc­tion That is ‘100% Accu­rate’

by | Permalink | Make a Comment ( 149 ) |

The Case for Studying Physics in a Charming Animated Video

in Animation, Physics | October 29th, 2013

Xiangjun Shi, oth­er­wise known as Shix­ie, stud­ied ani­ma­tion at RISD and physics at Brown. Then, she har­nessed her train­ing in both dis­ci­plines to cre­ate an ani­ma­tion explain­ing the virtue of study­ing physics. Pret­ty quick­ly, it gets to the crux of the mat­ter: Study­ing physics will change how you see the world and how you under­stand your place in it, all while let­ting you wrap your mind around some pret­ty elec­tri­fy­ing con­cepts. I think I’m sold!

You can find more videos by Shix­ie here.

H/T to Gareth for send­ing this video our way.…

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Free Online Physics Cours­es

An Ani­mat­ed His­to­ry of Physics Intro­duces the Dis­cov­er­ies of Galileo, New­ton, Maxwell & Ein­stein

The Hig­gs Boson, AKA the God Par­ti­cle, Explained with Ani­ma­tion

The Famous Feyn­man Lec­tures on Physics: The New Online Edi­tion (in HTML5)

by | Permalink | Make a Comment ( 7 ) |

Animated Video: Kurt Cobain on Teenage Angst, Sexuality & Finding Salvation in Punk Music

in Animation, Life, Music | October 22nd, 2013

The Blank on Blank “Lost Inter­view” series con­tin­ues to roll along. Today, they’ve released an ani­mat­ed video based on a July, 1993 inter­view with Nir­vana front­man Kurt Cobain. Record­ed less than a year before his death, the inter­view­er, Jon Sav­age, finds Cobain feel­ing rel­a­tive­ly opti­mistic, upbeat, bet­ter than he’d felt in years. The inter­view touch­es on many things, but, if there’s a com­mon theme, it’s iden­ti­ty — Cobain’s Irish­ness, his ques­tions about his sex­u­al­i­ty as a younger man, his views on women and sex­ism, his sense of being an out­sider through­out his child­hood, and how punk music saved him from all of that. Pre­vi­ous Blank on Blank videos have revived inter­views from Ray Charles, Janis Joplin, David Fos­ter Wal­lace, Jim Mor­ri­son & Dave Brubeck. For footage of Kurt Cobain back in the day, see some of the choice mate­r­i­al below.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Nir­vana Plays in a Radio Shack, the Day After Record­ing its First Demo Tape (1988)

Nirvana’s Home Videos: An Inti­mate Look at the Band’s Life Away From the Spot­light (1988)

The “Priest” They Called Him: A Dark Col­lab­o­ra­tion Between Kurt Cobain & William S. Bur­roughs

Kurt Cobain’s Iso­lat­ed Vocal Track From ‘Smells Like Teen Spir­it,’ 1991

by | Permalink | Make a Comment ( 1 ) |

« Go Back — More in this category... »
Quantcast
Open Culture was founded by Dan Colman.