30-Second Bunnies Theatre

30-Second Bunnies Theatre
Directed by	Jennifer Shiman
Produced by	Jennifer Shiman
Written by	Various
Starring	Douglas McInnes Jennifer Shiman John Mathot Shannon Torrence Michael Dougherty Bryan Singer
Distributed by	Angry Alien Productions Starz
Release date(s)	June 21, 2004 (Titanic)-2011
Running time	30 sec. (some films run over one minute)
Country
Language	English

30-Second Bunnies Theatre is a Webby Award-winning Flash cartoon series featuring films re-enacted by anthropomorphic animated bunnies in 30 seconds. The series is produced by Angry Alien Productions.

The series debuted in 2004, when website creator Jennifer Shiman was looking to create a funny web series. She created a version of The Exorcist, re-enacted by animated bunnies in only 30 seconds. It was a huge hit, prompting Shiman and company to create more "30 second bunny movies". In 2005, the "bunny troupe" was commissioned by Starz! to make new shorts. Each Starz-commissioned re-enactment has premiered on Starz on Demand as well as Starz Ticket before moving online. The series take on Star Wars was also featured on CNN on April 16, 2006. Recently, The series took on the popular comedy Borat! Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, which was released to the Starz Bunny Club on January 16, 2007, the day after Sacha Baron Cohen won the Golden Globe for Best Actor (Musical or Comedy). The short can be viewed here.

Angry Alien Productions finally released the shorts on DVD on October 20, 2009. However, the Titanic short was included on that film's 4-Disc Special Collector's Edition DVD, released in 2005.

In 2007, Crackle became a distributing partner, and as of 2009, has 30 of the shorts on their site.

In 2008, the site won two Webby Awards for Online Film and Video/Animation, as well as the People's Voice award in that category.

On June 13, 2010, Shiman announced on the 30-Second Bunnies Theatre Website that, after six years and 68 shorts, she was placing the series on hiatus to move on to other pursuits. The final short at the time was a re-enactment of the film Evil Dead II.

As of October 2011, Shiman completed three more re-enactments: Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, Freaks (1932) and a recently finished re-enactment of Michael Dougherty's Trick 'r Treat.

List of films

• Alien (1979)
• Back to the Future (1985)
• The Big Chill (1983)
• The Birds (1963)
• Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2006)
• Brokeback Mountain (2005)
• Caddyshack (1980)
• Casablanca (1942)
• A Christmas Story (1983)
• Christmas Vacation (1989)
• A Clockwork Orange (1971)
• Die Hard (1988)
• Evil Dead II
• The Exorcist (1973)
• Fight Club (1999)
• Freaks (1932)
• Freddy vs. Jason (2003)
• Gone With the Wind (1939)
• Goodfellas (1990)
• Grindhouse (2007)
• The Grudge (2004)
• Two-part Harry Potter Montage (2001–2007)
• Halloween (1978)
• Hellraiser (1987)
• Highlander (1986)
• It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
• James Bond Montage (1962–2006)
• Jaws (1975)
• Jurassic Park (1993)
• Kill Bill (Both volumes) (2003–2004)
• King Kong (1933)
• March of the Penguins (2005)
• My Dinner With Andre (1981)
• Napoleon Dynamite (2004)
• Night of the Living Dead (1968)
• No Country For Old Men (2007)
• Office Space (1999)
• Pirates of the Caribbean, 2 and 3 (2003, 2006, 2007 respectively)
• The Princess Bride (1987)
• Pulp Fiction (1994)
• Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
• Reservoir Dogs (censored and uncensored versions) (1992)
• The Ring (2002)
• Rocky (1976)
• The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
• Saw (2004)
• Scream (1996)
• Sixteen Candles (1984)
• The Shining (1980)
• Snakes on a Plane (2006)
• Spider-Man, 2 and 3 (2002, 2004, 2007 respectively)
• Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982)
• Star Wars (1977)
• Superbad (2007)
• Superman (1978)
• The Terminator (1984)
• The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003)
• 30 Days of Night (2007)
• Titanic (1997)
• Top Gun (1986)
• Trick 'r Treat (2007)
• Twilight (2008)
• The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009)
• The War of the Worlds (1953)
• The Wizard of Oz (1939)
• The Wolf Man (1941)

People's Choice

Starting August 1, 2006, fans could vote for the next Bunny re-enactment by text message. The contestants were The Silence of the Lambs, Fight Club, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Gone with the Wind. Voting ended September 5, 2006, and the winner was Fight Club, which was released after The Ring.

Aspect Ratios

The first eleven bunny shorts were created in full screen and standard-definition formats (The Exorcist and The Shining bunny shorts were shot in an aspect ratio of 1.37:1 instead of 1.33:1). All current bunny shorts from The War of the Worlds onwards are animated in widescreen and high-definition formats, although the Rocky bunny short (as a VW Fox commercial) is reformatted from its original ratio of 1.66:1 to the full screen ratio of 1.33:1 (cropping the left and right of the image), though not pan and scan as the camera stays directly in the center of the image. Like other television shows filmed in high-definition (such as American Idol, Father of the Pride, Curious George, and Out of Jimmy's Head) and other films filmed in high-definition (such as The Proud Family Movie, Tom and Jerry: The Fast and the Furry, Scooby-Doo! in Where's My Mummy?, High School Musical, and The Land Before Time XII: The Great Day of the Flyers), the monitor the animation team would have worked from would have 16:9 and 4:3 safe areas so that the full screen version would not crop off too much of any important visual elements (such as characters). All bunny shorts filmed in widescreen are seen on Starz on Demand and widescreen images of the shorts are shown, but with no black bars showing (an anamorphic print compressed to fit the full screen ratio). The bunny shorts created in full screen are on Starz on Demand as well, but some of them are slightly matted from their original full screen ratio of 1.33:1 to the widescreen ratio of 1.66:1 with no black bars showing (an anamorphic print compressed to fit the full screen ratio).

External links

• 30-Second Bunnies Theatre Official Website
• Jennifer Shiman interview at G4TV
• 30-Second Bunnies Theatre at the Internet Movie Database