A darkly brilliant stop-motion adaptation of The Pied Piper of Hamelin about a plague of rats that punish townsfolk corrupt with greed. One of Czechoslovakia's most ambitious animation projects of the 1980s, notable for its unusual dark art direction, innovative animation techniques and use of a fictitious language.
El flautista de Hamelín, Krysar, The Pied Piper of Hamelin, Krysar, le joueur de flûte de Hamelin, Ο Φλαουτίστας, Der Rattenfänger von Hameln, Krisar, 吹笛子的男人
Czechia
UKPG
USANR
Czechia
UK
USA
Watched this with the girls, who adore rats, and began to worry how they might react when the little guys started plummeting to their watery deaths. Before I could say anything though, my ten-year-old piped up: “You think that’s gonna kill a rat? Rats are great swimmers! They can tread water for three days! Do your research, dudes.”
Let's talk about that last rat.
When the rats are all throwing themselves to their deaths, one by one, flinging themselves from some kind of cliffside wall or turret, the last rat pauses.
She turns in a circle. She struggles to find reason. She fights the mind control of the Piper’s flute. She fights the horror of losing herself. She fights against the serious-faced wood carved man who looms above her, who has taken her will with his magic at his whim. She fights it. She fights and she loses.
Let's hear it for the last rat! May we all get one fleeting final glimpse of the forces that control us just before we go into the big drink.
I…
22th Review for The Collab Weekly Movie Watch
The Pied Piper of Hamelin is one of those stories that have always intrigued me, even though to this day and after seeing this stop motion version, I still cannot grasp all the complexity and meaning behind it all. A revenge-seeker who is able to do so by means of music is an intriguing thought. And here is no exception.
As for this short film, of all the stop motion films I've seen with the Collab guys, this one stands out from the rest. I was particularly taken with the gothic production design with elements reminiscent of German expressionism, along with the eccentric characters who made me both dread and laugh at…
"I was drawn to animation precisely because it is a world that has many possibilities, because it is a world of magic, a world of the imagination, a world of many as yet unexplored spheres." (Jirí Barta, Animator interview, 1988)
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Women Film Editors #231: Helena Lebdusková
Mini-Collab w/ Enrico
In recent months I've been doing my best to watch more animation, especially of the stop-motion variety - Inspiration, The Hand, Crocus, Dojoji Temple, Tango and The Sandman immediately come to mind - so I shouldn't be at all surprised to say that this 55-minute take on the Pied Paper tale, courtesy of Czech filmmaker Jirí Barta, has become my latest favorite. Let the rats topple the economy!…
Just as Mike Doughty sings his second bridge with fake words, I have thrown out my actual review and will be writing this review with fake words (shout out to the fake language used in this film!). Fake Word review coming in hot.
Foxclore zendupple stepjump salk Edith’s *Collab Film Group*.
Alor shumpento semisgro sen hyle tade mukshaf. Zal inko pimpsnel lowt spourmo genpipple quopen filt vun shipes du mavstill sa bever zanz kudordstop breken cheel. Malinfallin, rext lum sen bintergiggle fil steppen yodacloud tidling oonst lebellum! Yil yil yil zunk dedstappin bellar dunsk. Neilhauser deftyl oobenschpitz hoppo eeft sen inko sa neener calwhichen. Vun bevum le oko pudeen, swilltypen hozopozo fex wellar-dellar. Gouch isphalt amport sa deinken le cunta evopes calinko…
This stop motion movie directed by Jiří Barta looks so fresh!!
It’s an amazing piece released on 1986 about the pied piper of Hamelin. A flautist does the service of taking a plague of rats out of town, the only thing he wants back is the reward that the villagers promised.
I have a theory about this movie, I haven’t done any research and I haven’t read any review before so my theory is that this movie is an allegory of the arrival of Jesus and how malice and selfishness of people who live in Hamelin, whose acts are mean and inconsiderate, make him have to give them a lesson.
I will talk in this paragraph about what things give…
1st Jirí Barta
A unique and deliciously enjoyable piece of animation with a grotesque twist. I love the story of the Pied Piper because of the relevancy of various elements of the tale- the environmental concerns and how greed affects all but the richest least. Barta removes the children from the equation here and substitutes a romantic interest for the Piper. While this may seem like a curious decision, it does allow for a remarkably satisfying ending for the film, one that places the blame on the villagers and the whole rotten system for how it dehumanises people. The film presents a remarkably bleak view of humanity and human interactions, unsurprising for near-Glasnost era Czechoslovakia.
While these narrative changes are…
A metallic currency of shiny objects provides for heated exchanges between the wooden townsfolk of this curious land. Carved with care and presented with an interesting concoction of stop-motion flora and animated fauna, there is plenty of cinematic 'tech' to enjoy here.
In this society of class divide, the rich count their coins and the rats of the town live in the shadows, snatching what they can but always existing on the edge of society in danger of being captured and slaughtered for just, well, being. Are the rats simply metaphors for the lower classes, or the decay of a rotting society? Or, are they there to punish the greed of humanity? Either way, moments of Jar-Jar Binks style daftness…
"The Pied Piper" (1986), directed by Jiří Barta, is a Czechoslovakian stop motion wonderment. Coming in at about an hour's worth in length is a short undertaking that on full accounts takes advantage of its time to dazzle its viewership in wonderment. The film tells a tale that has inceptionally been around since the Middle Ages. Other's might have a different experience with this direct story, but with me personally, as I have heard this tale to some degree before when being reminded of it here, it seems to be a folk tale that didn't stick out as much as the other commercialized fairy or folk tales we see at a constant. This isn't a bad thing either, as this…
This was surprising good! Creepy but very effective. An animated retelling of The Pied Piper of Hamelin with a VERY dark edge, it’s my first exposure to Czech stop-motion animation director Jiri Barta who creatively uses wood as a medium. The menace here is not the bubonic plague but the evils of avarice - a desire to accumulate more and more wealth, regardless of the exploitation or harm it causes.
The ugliness of the villagers and especially the burghers in charge is shown not only in their appearance but also their behavior. The rats that overtake the village are ugly as well but they outnumber the villagers and cause havoc. The piper - here named Krysar (which…
Spine-chilling, stunningly animated, and completely immersive, Jiří Barta's Krysař is hands down one of the most remarkably accomplished and scintillating examples of stop-motion animation ever captured on film, though its narrative merits and crushingly dour tone can't match its technical splendor, leaving the viewer depleted and sullen by the end of its mercifully brief runtime.
I recently began a PhD program that has put a huge dent into my Letterboxd activities, and particularly my much-treasured participation in the Collab's hot takes on its weekly curiosities. This has been a sad development for me, as I loved the camaraderie and budding friendships I discovered in that happy little corner of the internet. However, with a minor surgery sidelining me for a…
A tactile German expressionism fairytale - wood-carvings mixed with Caligari-esque angled street landscapes met with touches of real images, a candle light, a stream, a rat -- all intertwined with cartoonishly horrifying replications of men and madness and blood and jewels and rats.
The last film I watched with the collab was Blood Tea & Red String, another stop-motion, dialogue-free film featuring rodents. Blood Tea (which I loved) was so delicately hand-crafted, warm but haunting, and full of tender care, and it was so feminine compared to The Pied Piper's hard-edged masculine tone. Everything in The Pied Piper feels cold, mean, scary, aggressive. It's jagged, it's angled, the music matches the direction of it all, and it's all brutal when you…
