MovieChat Forums > Sita Sings the Blues (2009) Discussion > Not a big fan.

Not a big fan.

posted 15 years ago by deadender13
14 replies | jump to latest

I just watched Sita sings the blues. It was okay. Ill list out some of the things i didn't like and some that i did.

Likes:
-The humor - The commentary of the puppets was top notch and i enjoyed most of the humor sprinkled through out the film

-The soundtrack- I enjoyed The music portions a lot.

-The way the story was told (filling in the blanks of the bio parts with the Indian stories)- very well done, It was what kept me from turning the movie off. If was clever and had a bit a humor. With out sinking to the depths of adult humor.

-Color palette-Very colorful It made the lacking character designs pop, giving them some sense of design. Each Palette for each portion of the film works.

Dislikes
-The animation- Completely flat, And sick of animators using "it's the style" excuse. Flash has really crippled animation. The cut paper style of animating works for the shadow puppets portion of the movie, but it being used through out the film was a bad idea. The hand draw animation was just bad, If she waned to get the "real life" aspect across she could of sketched it with pencil not use vectors. Sketching in vector looks horrible every time. This just happen to not beanimated very well and have bad design.

-the character designs- There is a way to make a simple character look appealing , and its not using the primitive shapes in flash. Again It worked for the puppet portion, but the rest of the film really lacked appealing character designs. She just used the same design over and over for different characters. Boring and repetitious.

-the city designs - No sense of design what so ever. There is a way to design something to make it look like a mess but have it make sense and look appealing.

- the whole rotoscope scene -In my mind can completely be removed actually I completely fast forwarded this part. I understand it was suppose to be her anger and disappointment that her man that she love left her. It went on way too long, probably because she was short on time for a full feature film. Plus it was rotoscoping, BAD vector rotoscoping with masked out patterns. Had it been done well and not so long I wouldn't of by passed it completely.

-the intermission scene- Again another fill in, Because she needed filler to stretch the animation to feature length. I completely skipped this part as well. Reminded me of animation class and students running too short for the given animation project would put a complete 5-1 counter and intro to their animation. Waste of Time and insult to intelligence.

This was just my opinion,

5 out of 10

[–] CinematicIslander 15 years ago

Hi deadender13,

I wholeheartedly agree on the positive points - and well, your dislikes does add diversity to the critique.

Yet, to my untrained eyes, not even one of the problems that you mentioned here occurred to me when I was watching it. Take for instance the whole rotoscope sequence. Although I can't say much about vector masking (how it was done as opposed to how it _should_ be), the blending of colorful - albeit supposedly horribly done rotoscoping - with the loud industrial music cum Indian overtones was a welcome inclusion amidst the bland flash-animations you mentioned. As for the vector-illustrations, I think it accommodates Annette Hanshaw's deep vibrato and velvet-like voice.

Does it really detract from the enjoyment value of the average movie-goer? Not so much. Anywhos, just adding something to the pool of opinions here. I'd rate this movie 8/10 on account of fine assimilation of style, music and artistic rendition.

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[–] SinglePlex 15 years ago

While I must state upfront that I do not agree with your dislikes, I appreciate that you didn't just rudely diss the film like often seen on other IMDB boards.

AFAIK, the animation is pretty much a single-handled effort. As a layman and a viewer, I was blown away by the diversity of styles and how apt they were to represent the scenes they did. She also stayed loyal to the style, moving seamlessly from one style to another for the same character. What you describe as "flat" and "amateur", to my mind appeared as bold and creative. Something that larger, established animators like Pixar and Disney have long abandoned. (Unlike Toy Story, Nemo and even The Incredibles, Wall-E broke no new ground. Neither thematically nor in the WOW factor)

Another aspect why this resonated with me could be her irreverent look at Hindu mythology. If this movie was widely released in India, there would be riots and Nina would have to live in fear and exile. She shakes up not just the narrator-perspective but the whole attitude of "Ram can do no wrong". Many of us have stifled debates on objectionable acts commited by him even in the original story, because, well, he is God. To use humor and song to question the statu-quo, without ruffling too many religious feathers, is no mean feat.

The intermission scene was my favorite, by the way!

I enjoyed your critique and it set me thinking. I hope more and more people see and discuss this awesome effort.

[–] The_Black_Ghost 15 years ago

I watched it as a part of a class, but I felt wholly confused by this film.

I really couldnt figure out at any point what kind of film it was--comedy, musical, random flash animation, music video, history, or religious narrative.

I mean, for a film with probably a really really low budget I have to give credit to the animator(s)? and the producer for at least telling the story in a creative way---but I felt lost. The sort of jib-jab narration was a little strange too because sometimes you couldnt hear the words as they talked at the same time and often contradicted each other so I dont know if its a truly accurate depiction of the original story, and it really doesnt have a meaning...was Sita right to let her life waste away for that moron? Was Ravana really bad if Rama was just as bad? Why did the monkeys follow Rama without question when he was clearly so self-centered? Did Rama really regret what he did?

All of this is left up in the air in this animation. I would guess the Ramanaya itself has more to say on specific moral points in the story and answers some of these questions, but the film leaves me guessing. I liked the songs and the animation was creative at least, and there was some humor.

6/10

[–] DaWeirdo 15 years ago

"I really couldnt figure out at any point what kind of film it was--comedy, musical, random flash animation, music video, history, or religious narrative. "

What's wrong with that? Films are allowed to borrow from many different genres. I'm tired of hearing this stuff in classes, people needing to be stuck in little boxes of one genre.

It was all of the above.

[–] The_Black_Ghost 14 years ago

I dont care if it has a specific genre, but it just didnt settle for me personally.

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[–] dagrattle 14 years ago

I mean, for a film with probably a really really low budget I have to give credit to the animator(s)? and the producer for at least telling the story in a creative way---but I felt lost. The sort of jib-jab narration was a little strange too because sometimes you couldnt hear the words as they talked at the same time and often contradicted each other so I dont know if its a truly accurate depiction of the original story, and it really doesnt have a meaning...was Sita right to let her life waste away for that moron? Was Ravana really bad if Rama was just as bad? Why did the monkeys follow Rama without question when he was clearly so self-centered? Did Rama really regret what he did?

I think that's part of what the movie was getting at, though. It's not so much that it neglected to answer those questions as it asked the audience to think about them.

There are a lot of movies, some very good, that never answer every question they raise (2001, Duel, The Brother from Another Planet - and a bit in Lone Star, too - and No Country for Old Men, to name a few). Not getting a definitive answer in itself isn't a bad thing, and can serve to make telling a tale a pretty powerful experience. And the inverse - answering the question in an obvious fashion - can deflate the tires on a tale pretty badly. In this case, I think the method went pretty far in reflecting the chaos that Nina Paley felt with the collapse of her marriage and the aftermath.

[–] thatguy_78757 14 years ago

Matthew sings the blues, because he rented SITA SINGS THE BLUES and then found out its free online

Matthew remembered how much hype it got in independent film and animation websites

Matthew forgot that the hype was about behind the scenes drama, and not if it was a good movie or not

its not

repetitive flash animation, some innovative Indian style design work in the first scenes thats repeated over and over. The stories (plural) are hard to follow and confusing.

Nina Paley, the director, has the ancient Indian legendary character sing old 1920s torchy breakup songs that she assumed were in public domain- they weren't. Much has been written about her expensive battles to get the rights to the songs.... the true copyright holders are long dead and big corporations bought them up and charge huge fees for their use- even though hardly anybody would want them. In a perfect world she should have had the right to use them, but this isn't and she doesn't. For all the time and effort she put into battling for the rights to those old recordings, wouldn't it have been easier and cheaper to just pay some struggling up and coming musicians ( they ARE a dime a dozen!) to come up with new original songs that have an old feel?

This is the kind of movie I feel like I SHOULD admire, I SHOULD like, its different and took a lot of headaches to get done. SO its a case of something I admire more than "like". It would have made a better short than a feature.

[–] mala_education 14 years ago

I really liked this movie but can see why others find it subpar. To be honest it's not one of the best at all, it gets jumbled and confusing in some parts and also lackluster and boring in others.

The saving grace were the narrators telling the story. They were hilarious and the animation worked well with them and on the parts where the figures acted out the scenes. The music of course was great and I like how Paley mixed the two modes of storytelling.

If the film had been strictly the narrators, blues music, and painted pictures with a solid ending, Sita would have been perfect.

Looking for a good film??http://malaeducation.blogspot.com/

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