It’s nice to see someone like Michel Gondry constantly using commercials to further is art (Gondry typically uses commercial opportunities, much like videos as short-form experiments that inform his feature work). The spot is typically inventive Gondry and uses a seeming mix of media, computer animation, regular stop-motion animation and the French director’s patented in-camera optical tricks. The ad also has it’s own microsite.
Having finished “Be Kind Rewind,” which is due in early 2008, Gondry has apparently already moved on to working on his next feature – the much-discussed and much-delayed – “Master Of Space And Time,” an adaptation of the Rudy Rucker book with screenwriter Daniel Clowes (the graphic novelist behind “Ghost World” and “Art School Confidential.”)
Gondry’s been talking about ‘Space And Time’ since at least 2002, so let’s hope he finally gets it off the ground. Jack Black was originally pegged to star in the film, but being that he’s in ‘Rewind,’ this may have changed (and in fact the somewhat unreliable IMDB no longer has him listed as part of the film – again, take that with a grain of salt).
Synopsis: The real world is unbearable to madcap inventor Harry Gerber, so he uses his genius to twist the laws of science and create his own tailor-made universe. Master of Space and Time combines high physics and high jinks, blurring the line between science and magic.