Your Face
| Your Face | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Bill Plympton |
| Music by | Maureen McElheron |
Production company | Plymptoons Studio |
Release date |
|
Running time | 3 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Your Face is a 1987 animated short film by Bill Plympton.[1] It involves a man seated in a chair crooning about the face of his lover, and as he sings, his own face starts to distort in various ways. His song ends abruptly when a mouth opens in the floor and swallows him and the chair whole; after the closing credits, the mouth reappears and licks its lips.
Music
The vocals were that of Maureen McElheron, known for composing the songs in The Tune, also by Bill Plympton.[2] After the song was recorded,[3] it was slowed by one-third, giving the desired and unusual effect, also making the voice more masculine.[4] His face is distorted into many different shapes, such as a balloon, a cube and an ice cream cone.
Lyrics
The song is all original,[5] made specifically for this short film, and the lyrics depict a metaphorical description of someone's face by using musical vocabulary to describe the beauty of their features.[6]
Legacy
The short received a nomination for Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film at the 60th Academy Awards.[7][8][9]
A variation of this short was used as the couch gag on The Simpsons's 29th season episode "3 Scenes Plus a Tag from a Marriage", with Homer Simpson's face replacing the original man, and Dan Castellaneta singing the vocals. This version ends with the Simpson family sitting on their living room couch.[10]
Your Face was preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2015.[11]
References
- ^ Films by Bill Plympton - The Criterion Channel
- ^ Robinson, Tasha (September 14, 2012). "In 1992, Bill Plympton made history by drawing an entire film on his own". The A.V. Club. Retrieved April 18, 2018.
- ^ Maureen McElheron - Your Face (speed version)-YouTube
- ^ Your Face by Maureen McElheron- Topic on YouTube
- ^ Your Face - Films by Bill Plympton - The Criterion Channel
- ^ Oddball Films: Metamorphic Cinema: Meditations on Transformation - Thur. May 12th - 8PM
- ^ The Man Who Planted Trees Wins Animated Short: 1988 Oscars
- ^ Pond, Steve (November 30, 2010). "Shortlist for Oscar Animated Shorts Includes Pixar, Bill Plympton". TheWrap. Retrieved April 18, 2018.
- ^ "The 60th Academy Awards (1988) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Retrieved 16 October 2011.
- ^ Perkins, Dennis (March 25, 2018). "Another retcon of Marge and Homer's marriage leaves us wondering who these impostor Simpsons are". The A.V. Club. Retrieved April 18, 2018.
- ^ "Preserved Projects". Academy Film Archive.