My recent piece on "Homer³" got me thinking about just how strange and downright disorientating a lot of those early experiments in computer generated animation were. A new horizon of boundless potential was opening up before our eyes, bringing with it a positively futuristic means of representing our hopes, dreams and passions, and the results often felt as though they had been plucked straight out of a surrealist nightmare - which could, of course, be an entirely beautiful thing in its own right. Take Adam Powers, The Juggler (1981), a nascent demonstration in motion capture techniques from Richard Taylor and Gary Demos. Motion capture has come a long way since Taylor and Demos' pioneering efforts, but it still holds up splendidly as a short animation by virtue of how mind-bogglingly weird it is. It's practically exercise in taking something recognisably human and having reality bend all around it. The future was exciting, but also alien and uncanny.
On the flipside of the equation was Snoot and Muttly (1984), one of the first films to really push the envelope in exploring the technology's potential to tell stories, with characters capable of conveying emotion to which viewers could relate. The story being told was, appropriately enough, about finding familiarity within the unfamiliar, by illustrating a moment in which connection is forged between two characters operating on ostensibly disparate dispositional wavelengths. Snoot and Muttly was created by Susan Van Baerle and Douglas Kingsbury of Ohio State University, with music by John Berton. It's a deceptively simple piece - two flightless birds, each the other's polar opposite, cross paths, and genial antics ensue - but incredibly busy in its ambitions. Characters who interacted with their environment and one another, who were equipped with their own individual characteristics and mannerisms, and were expressive enough to carry a visual narrative for three and a quarter minutes (in a way that clearly illustrated how said characters had grown and developed by the end) were weighty undertakings for CG animation at the time. There is no dialogue in Snoot and Muttly, but it seems obvious enough that "Snoot" refers to the red and orange bird - ie: the snooty one who walks with their head held high - while Muttly (as the name implies, the more humble of the two) is the blue and yellow one in search of a companion. The characters' silence also has them remain androgynous; I'd always assumed Snoot to be female because of that very feminine-looking hat the character dons at the end - but really, who knows? I notice that in this contemporary article from The Lantern, Van Bearle avoids assigning either bird a gender, so I will do the same here.
Snoot and Muttly was clearly conceived with an eye toward demonstrating how two computer-generated characters, similar in design, could exhibit distinct differences in personality, and for as basic as the animation might seem now, it gives you a strong impression of who each bird is. Muttly's initial reaction, on noticing Snoot, is to imitate their very uppity mode of walking, but even as Muttly copies Snoot, there is a definite jauntiness to their movements that makes plain their more jovial intentions. The world the birds inhabit likewise feels fresh and alive, combining the vibrancy of its tropical greenery with touches of idiosyncratic whimsy, such as the multi-coloured array of propeller-operated spheres that hover around like swarms of insects. The row of buildings (suggestive of a somewhat wider community of unseen characters), are simple in design, looking like a collection of boxes stacked atop one another, but have a whimsy of their own, with their rainbow colouration and doors and windows of assorted shapes - they look like like a surreal cross between a themed children's play area and a disco light box (as a bonus, there's a nice detail in which Snoot's house is seen to tilt shortly before they emerge at the front). It's a world that seems perfectly self-contained for the purposes of the story, while giving the sense that there might be a whole lot more that could still be explored. Playful, innocent discovery is the theme bolstered by Berton's twinkly synth score, which strikes me as notably similar to the soundtracks that would later accompany the earlier Rugrats adventures. Berton does a nice job of giving each of the characters their own musical identity; the notes echoing Snoot's prim movements feel harsher and more blaring, conveying their grandioseness and initial hostility, while Muttly's have more of a peppy energy, with just the right hint of solitary yearning, as they attempt to endear themselves to the distant Snoot.
The range of emotions the characters exhibit are beautifully realised, lucid enough to support the narrative progression, but subtle enough that it doesn't feel forced or overbearing. Snoot is at first surprised to find Muttly trailing behind them, before making it clear that they want nothing to do with them. The swarm of spheres then flutters overhead, and Snoot's expression softens; already you can see the flickers of curiosity in their eyes, cluing us in that there's a well of untapped larkiness within that starchy avian form that has yet to be embraced. Muttly, meanwhile, might be predominantly a free spirit, but they get to display their share of confusion and an inkling of hurt at Snoot's reluctance to join them in the chase. Van Bearle and Kingsbury manage to work in a bit of viewer misdirection at the end - Snoot retreats back into their funky abode and for a moment we think they've ditched Muttly, when in actuality they've gone in to get dressed for the occasion. The flowery pink hat they emerge wearing provides one of the film's quirkiest visual touches, allowing Snoot to undergo a visible change of heart while retaining their characteristically dapper disposition. The film ends with the two birds running after the spheres together, as the camera pans to an overhead view showing two spheres, one red, one yellow, appearing to bounce off one another's energy, a further symbol of the connection forged between our heroes. Actually, I'm surprised that they didn't make the second sphere blue, just to make the visual echo all the more obvious, but I suppose yellow works as Muttly's secondary colour (beside, none of the spheres in the swarm are blue; that particular variation is apparently non-existent around here).
Again, not a lot happens in terms of narrative, but Snoot and Muttly moves along with such an earnestly impassioned charm. There's something about these birds, and the guilelessness of their primitive yet sprightly world, that draws me in every time.
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