WEBINAR: 12 JANUARY 2023
January 12, 2023
Webinar on YouTube
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WEBINAR: 12 JANUARY 2023
Presented by Netflix
January 12, 2023
APOLLO 10 ½: CRAFTING A HANDMADE CULTURAL ZEITGEIST
Richard Linklater knew he wanted to make a movie that captured what it was like to grow up in the Houston suburbs at the height of the space program but the approach to telling that story developed over a period of years and didn’t catalyze until he approached longtime friend and collaborator Tommy Pallotta about making an animated film.
The 60s was a time of innovation and pushing boundaries and much like the period itself, Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood is also pushing technical boundaries. Using a new approach lovingly dubbed “2.5D,” Linklater and Pallotta have captured the look and feel of the period in a manner that feels both cozy and familiar and timeless.
In this webinar, writer, director and producer Richard Linklater, and Head of Animation and producer Tommy Pallotta, discuss the duo’s animated odyssey over the course of two decades, exploring how their experiences on Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly informed their approach to Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood and how their new film is completely different from anything they’ve done before, pushing animation in new and unexpected directions.
BIOGRAPHIES
Richard Linklater
Director, Writer, Producer
Linklater also serves as the Artistic Director for the Austin Film Society, which he founded in 1985 to showcase films from around the world that were not typically shown in Austin. Now one of the nation’s top film organizations, The Austin Film Society runs a film studio, a two-screen arthouse theater, a community media center, a variety of educational programs, and has given out over $2,300,000 in grants to Texas filmmakers since 1996.
Tommy Pallotta
Head of Animation, Producer
Tommy Pallotta received a degree in Philosophy from the University of Texas at Austin. He met Richard Linklater and began his film career as an actor and production assistant on Linklater's directorial debut, Slacker (1991).
Pallotta then wrote, directed, and produced his first feature film, The High Road (1997). He also produced several animated projects, including Snack and Drink (1999), a three-minute short about an autistic child in a 7-Eleven store. Snack and Drink is now part of the permanent collection of the New York Museum of Modern Art. It is during this period that Pallotta co-developed the first digital rotoscope technique.
Tommy first connected Richard Linklater with animation when he produced the award-winning feature film, Waking Life. He followed up with Philip K. Dick's A Scanner Darkly, starring Keanu Reeves and Robert Downey Jr. He has directed the Emmy-nominated interactive “Collapsus” and the Emmy-winning documentary/animation hybrid Last Hijack. He co-directed the documentary More Human than Human and built a robot to replace himself and finish the film. He is currently Executive Producer on the critically acclaimed “Undone,” an animated series for Amazon. Once again, he has reunited with Richard Linklater and is Producer and Head of Animation on Apollo 10 1⁄2 for Netflix.
MODERATOR
Marina Antunes
President // Spark CG Society
Marina has been writing and discussing film for over 15 years, first on a personal blog, followed by a decade-long tenure on the now retired Row Three. In 2008, she joined the writing staff at Quiet Earth, becoming Editor-In-Chief in 2014, a role she still holds. Over the years, she has also produced and hosted a number of podcasts including Before the Dawn, a long-running podcast on the Twilight franchise, Girls on Pop, a podcast on film and popular entertainment from women’s perspective and After the Credits, bi-monthly film podcast with nearly 300 episodes.
Marina is a member of ACM and ACM SIGGRAPH, the Online Film Critics Society, the Alliance of Women Film Journalists, and the Visual Effects Society. She is the President of Spark CG Society and the Vancouver ACM SIGGRAPH chapter. She has also served on juries for several film festivals including DOXA, St. Louis International Film Festival, and the Whistler Film Festival. She joined the Spark CG Society in 2014.
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