It's Such a Beautiful Day (film)
| It's Such a Beautiful Day | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical poster for the film. | |
| Directed by | Don Hertzfeldt |
| Produced by | Don Hertzfeldt |
| Written by | Don Hertzfeldt |
| Starring |
|
| Cinematography | Don Hertzfeldt |
| Edited by | Brian Hamblin |
Production company |
Bitter Films |
| Distributed by | Cinemad Presents |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 62 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
It's Such a Beautiful Day is an experimental black comedy-drama animated film directed, written, animated, and produced by award-winning animator Don Hertzfeldt as his first feature film. The film is divided into three chapters and follows the story of a stick-figure man named Bill, who struggles with his failing memory and absurdist visions, among other symptoms of an unknown illness. The film employs both offbeat humor and serious philosophical musings. It received critical acclaim and won numerous awards.
Release
It had a limited theatrical run[1] before becoming available on DVD,[1] Vimeo,[2] iTunes,[2] and Netflix.
The three chapters of the film were originally produced and released independently as animated short films, captured entirely on 35mm film with in-camera special effects.
The first installment, Everything Will Be OK, was released in 2006 and won the 2007 Sundance Film Festival Grand Prize for Short Film. The second installment, I Am So Proud of You was released in 2008. The third and final chapter of the trilogy, It's Such a Beautiful Day, shares the same name as the feature-length movie and was released in 2011 to similar acclaim, including the Audience Award from the Ottawa International Animation Festival.
In 2015, Hertzfeldt began a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter for a Blu-Ray release consisting of both the feature version of It's Such a Beautiful Day, as well as his 2015 short, World of Tomorrow.[3] By the end of the campaign, backers had raised more than seven times the needed amount.[3]
Synopsis
In the film, the main character Bill struggles with many strange experiences and deteriorating memories. He is confused, just as the audience, as he reflects on his mundane experiences and his hallucinatory ones. Eventually, it is revealed that he has a terminal illness, and his mind has been dying the whole movie.
Critical response
It's Such a Beautiful Day received wide acclaim from film critics. The film holds a score of 90/100 on Metacritic, based on seven reviews.[4] Of the trilogy, Steven Pate of The Chicagoist wrote, "There is a moment in each installment of Don Hertzfeldt's masterful trilogy of animated shorts where you feel something in your chest. It's an unmistakably cardiac event, the kind that great art can elicit when something profound and undeniably true is conveyed about the human condition. That's when you say to yourself: are stick figures supposed to make me feel this way? In the hands of a master, yes. And Hertzfeldt is to stick figures what Franz Liszt was to planks of ebony and ivory and what Ted Williams was to a stick of white ash: someone so transcendentally expert that to describe what they do in literal terms is borderline demeaning."[5]
The Los Angeles Film Critics Association named it their runner-up for Best Animated Feature Film of the year, behind Frankenweenie. Indiewire ranked Hertzfeldt the 9th best Film Director of the Year in its annual poll (tied with Wes Anderson), and film critics for The A.V. Club ranked the film #8 on their list of the Best Films of 2012. Slate Magazine named It's Such a Beautiful Day their pick for Best Animated Feature Film of 2012.
In the United Kingdom, the film was ranked #3 on Time Out London's list of the 10 Best Films of 2013, and #4 on The London Film Review's list of the same.
In 2014, Time Out ranked It's Such a Beautiful Day #16 on their list of the "100 Best Animated Movies Ever Made." Critic Tom Huddleston described it as "one of the great outsider artworks of the modern era, at once sympathetic and shocking, beautiful and horrifying, angry and hilarious, uplifting and almost unbearably sad."[6]
In 2016, The Film Stage critics ranked the film #1 on their list of the "Best Animated Films of the 21st Century (So Far)." [7]
References
- 1 2 Wickman, Forrest. "The Best Animated Film of the Year". Slate.com. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- 1 2 Merry, Stephanie (14 November 2014). "Watch online: 'The Girl,' 'Amor Cronico' and 'It's Such a Beautiful Day'". The Washington Post. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- 1 2 Chavez, Danette. "Get Involved, Internet: Fund a Blu-ray release of Don Hertzfeldt's World Of Tomorrow". AVClub. Retrieved 17 December 2015.
- ↑ "It's Such a Beautiful Day Reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved September 12, 2016.
- ↑ Pate, Steven (28 February 2012). "Don Hertzfeldt at the Music Box". Chicagoist. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- ↑ Huddleston, Tom (23 June 2015). "The 100 best animated movies: the list". Time Out. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- ↑ "The 50 Best Animated Films of the 21st Century Thus Far".