ReaderKenka
Let's be realistic.
Supelice
Dreadfully Boring
Gary
The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.
croinkix
I'm not too good at articulating my thoughts, but I'll try to just to get more people to watch this amazing. I could go on about the visuals, and music, but there's no way I could do it justice. This IMDb score doesn't do it justice! It makes me want to throw my computer out the window, how unjustifiably low it is. People complain about the acting, but I love it. Not ironically whatsoever, it makes clear all the heart that went into making this, with complete lack of cynicism towards the process, and pure ambition and results to offer with that ambition, some of the dialogue even works like beautiful poetry, like when the mother interrupts the doctor at the beginning. And I sympathized with the doctor I could sense his compassion for the twins and I dug his whole character movement from beginning to end. The way it was made reminded me of Nic Winding Refn's approach where it has a low budget movie vibe, but the emotions that are focused on rise above that whole novelty sector, and so you end up with an excellent piece of art. I very much loved the music and sounds the film had to offer, the aesthetics. The film definitely gotta be up there, with the greatest movies I've seen in my life time, definitely check it out, I can't recommend it enough. If you're into Svankmajer, Lynch (especially if you're into Twin Peaks or even eraserhead) or heck even Jodorosky, I mainly say Jodorosky because of all the heart put into this, with unapologetic-ally expressive imagery, though unlike Jodorosky,I feel like there's a less dogmatic approach to it,it's just presented as a story and the story is marvelous. I listed a couple directors, but the Leiser brothers have a unique style. They put their very soul into this , and this movie is one that healed me, and it's full of life and energy. I can't say that for another movie I've watched, though that's on a more personal level. It's work that had a purpose, but was honest. The ending was also super rad. I loved the microscope scene, and the church scene with the doctor. Beautiful story. (I know i'm all over the place, but i don't care) Amazing film, it's brought so so so so much joy to my life with it's tender scenes filled with lots of emotions that come out naturally, the film never forces me to feel a specific way, i can feel however i want, and the ambiguity gives the film life. A must watch simply said. For any age.
marietwinnings
visionary indie artfilm offers disjointed scenes of great imagination: "Imagination" is bold and excellent personal spiritual art; many sights and sounds are utterly magical and memorably symbolic. However this doesn't mean the film can satisfy commercial standards, or even that many art house audiences will be able to enjoy it. The hauntingly original animation and varied dreamlike music, which complement each other well and remain sincerely accessible throughout, do ensure a certain level of general appreciation. Students of film will admire techniques combining stop motion puppets, drawn animation, time lapse, and more. It's the other problems that will push away mainstream viewers, including amateurish live acting (poor casting decisions were clearly made, though the girls are sweet and the psychiatrist is passable), naive non-credible scripting (much better dialogue was needed to set up a doctor who gets custody of recently orphaned special-needs children in an stark alienating lab), and unimpressive uneven cinematography. Truly the soul doesn't care about such flaws and limitations, since spiritual growth is all about sincerity and hitting the high points, which this film has in abundance. There are scenes that will stay with you, especially those set in the mythic woods of eyed trees that was previously released in a stand-alone short called "Forest". Unlike Hollywood, the soul cares about quality rather than quantity. If an artwork has even just an audience of one that is deeply touched, then it will resonate to endure and change the universe forever. In this regard, Imagination is tremendously successful.
jasonmammon
Imagination is a collaborative experimental film effort by brothers Eric and Jeffrey Leiser, which combines hand-drawn animation, stop-motion puppet animation, pixilation, and time-lapse techniques (by director/animator Eric) with a haunting musical score (by composer Jeffrey). They co-wrote the story about a neuro-psychologist's attempts to understand two twin girls: Anna, who is diagnosed with a rare form of autism called Asperger's, and Sarah, who is diagnosed as legally blind. The girls connect with each other through the realm of their imaginations, expressed through surreal animated imagery. Most of the film consists of using these abstract dreamscapes to show a window into how the girls experience their world, and other dialogue scenes of the psychologist with the girls' parents tie the story together.The idea behind this film resonated with me personally, given that I am not only a stop-motion animator, but also have a younger brother with autism. Many autistic children, such as those my mother works with as a special education teacher, are non-verbal, but my brother Jonathan is of a higher functioning kind, very similar to Raymond Babbitt in Rain Man. I often wish I could enter my brother's brain and see how differently he sees the world around him, so I appreciate how Imagination uses animation to suggest this very idea. Leiser's animation, inspired by the work of Czech stop-motion legend Jan Svankmeyer, also resonates with spiritual symbolism, including the recurring appearance of a white fawn or stag. The white stag is a traditional symbol of Christ which hearkens back to the medieval myth of St. Eustace, and has been alluded to in contemporary myths like Narnia and the Harry Potter series. In my own experience with autism, I believe that there is a direct connection these children have which possibly brings them into a very close intimacy with the spiritual realm. It's possible, in my view, that people with autism and Asperger's have keys to certain doors in the human brain that for the rest of us are simply locked. (My brother, on occasion, used to wander around the house repeating to himself that "Jesus Christ is the Son of God." To him, though he may not understand the theological implications behind this, it's simply a fact that he understands in his own way…I often wonder if he understands it better than the rest of us.)
penwalden
In "imagination", Sarah and Anna Woodruff (played by Jessi and Nikki Haddad, respectively) are twin sisters who confound everyone around them. Their father is distant and eventually leaves the family. Their mother (Courtney Sanford) is anxious and frantic for answers. And a child neurologist (Ed K. Gildersleeve) who initially diagnosed Anna with a rare form of autism isn't so sure. Sarah- who's near blind- and Anna live within their own world, a shared imagination that includes prophetic dreams and visions. They are almost the same person in a way, occasionally speaking in unison, rarely separated from one another. When tragedy strikes, the doctor is left with more questions than answers. I'll admit to being a little confused as to what the film is about. What I can clearly state is that it is a representation of the closeness some siblings- and twins in particular- share with one another (something I would imagine Eric Leiser, who directed the film and co-wrote the screenplay with his brother/composer Jeffrey, knows much about). At first I thought we might be watching an exploration into the gifted minds of the two sisters, and how their respective disabilities work to enhance such gifts, which in itself would be an interesting story. After a while, however, the film seemed to morph into a look inwards at how faith guides us into our eventual destination in life, and while that may be the best description I can give of the film, it doesn't account necessarily for the almost supernatural aspect of the film, as evident in both the storytelling method and the ambiguous ending. One of the things that struck me as particular inspired about the film was how well Leiser didn't allow the obvious budgetary limitations get in the way of telling the story as best he could (it helps that he gets an assist from his brother Jeffrey on the music, which helps propel the narrative forward, even if it's not terribly subtle). In a way, the film benefits from the limitations, using low-budget effects like high-speed photography, stop-motion animation, and photographic and sound effects to put us very much in Sarah and Anna's world. (Of particular note is how Leiser makes us feel, convincingly, that an earthquake is taking place through simple camera and sound tricks.) Many times the film reminded me of Michel Gondry's lovely "The Science of Sleep" from last year in such touches, and although it isn't on solid enough ground thematically to compare to that film in overall quality, it does make for a distinctly endearing quality that will benefit the film on multiple viewings. This is my first experience with Leiser's work- he's an established veteran of a couple of features now and many shorts in the independent film community- and was, on the whole, impressed by what I saw in "imagination" (he emailed me recently in the interest of getting a review from the site). His film- which has played at a few festivals and has video distribution lined up for a February 2008 DVD release- is a thoughtful and imaginative work, and will play well for anyone looking for something beyond the usual by-the-numbers explorations at the mysteries of life, even if I wasn't completely clear as to what the film's final point was.
