Animation Theatre: Lotte Reiniger

2nd June 1899- 19th June 1981

Fig. 1 Lotte Reiniger

Lotte Reiniger was a revolutionary figure in the world of animation in that she brought the art of shadow puppetry further in storytelling through filmmaking. Reiniger was a German silhouette animator and film director who is highly regarded as strongly embodying the art stylisation of the Avant Garde because of how independent and different her works were as a film direction. It was as a child that Reiniger became intrigued by the Chinese art of shadow puppetry and not much later on that film and cinema became a major love of hers. She was especially influenced by Paul Wegener who after much work noticed her and enlisted Reiniger to produced title cards for his films, suitably highly elaborate silhouette formations. It was the success of Wegener and Reinigers work on The Pied Piper of Hamlin that kicked off Reinigers career of animation. Reinigers most well-known piece of work is probably her 1926, The Adventures of Prince Achmed which is mistakenly forgotten to be the first animated feature length film beating Walt Disney to it more than a decade earlier. It is hard to remember that every single element of this feature is formed of delicate paper cut outs that were all done by hand alone because the action on screen unfolds so smoothly and realistically, not looking like hand craft that we do not stop to question and think about how it came about. This alone just shows how talented Reiniger was with the craft of paper cutting especially when she is the main worker behind each of her works something teacher William Mortiz has praised her for. Lotte Reiniger herself is the prime genius behind all of her films. She had an astonishing facility with cutting- holding the scissors still in her right hand, and manipulating the paper at lightning speed with her left hand so that the cut always went in the right direction. (Mortiz: 1996)

Fig. 2 The Adventures of Prince Achmed

The art of the fairy-tale is another prominent feature of Reinigers work; it isnt just that the fairy-tale genre was where her talents were at work storytelling wise. It is also the style and experience of her labour that brings across the fairy-tale vibe. When we think of fairy-tales we normally associate them with elegance, decorative feature, delicacy and fantasy but also simplicity. Reinigers work is highly denotative of these qualities; lets take her 1922 Cinderella for instance. Yes the story is all fairy-tale but Reinigers technique further evokes this genre and theme, the silhouettes of these characters are highly elegant just look at the prince with his long slim legs, the silhouettes also act to stop unnecessary detail detracting from the story and animation. Reiniger has defined each character through highly contrasting cut outs, the tall slim prince, the puffy dress of Cinderella and the narrow but pointier cuttings of the ugly sisters and this is all we need to effectively understand the film, simple yet expressive character design. It is however, the talent of Reiniger which takes this simplicity but also makes it delicate and decorative. We are presented with blocks of black broken up by miniature cuts to simulate more characteristics such as Cinderellas princess like dress and the distasteful clothing of the sisters, she then goes on to move these figures through stop motion and the delicacy and dreamlike nature of the fairy-tale is fully conjured. The delicacy and fantasy of fairy-tales suited her intricate, imaginative technique, and they made up the bulk of her output. (Kemp: Unknown)

Fig. 3 Cinderella

There is no doubt that Lotte Reiniger is a highly important and evocative figure in the world of film direction. She has taken a historically effective storytelling technique of shadow puppetry and blown us all away with imaginative and purely magical visuals that merge with the storylines and giving her this extremely effective technique. Her cuttings are not just cuttings but become alive with performance, something animators after her seem to have left untouched with regards to silhouette animation, perhaps they just cannot seem to understand how she came to do it; it does seem like there is some magical secret involved. Even though her work reduces images to their very basics, theres incredible grace, complexity and variety to the performances of the paper actors. Its impossible to see exactly how she accomplished it (ONeill: 2008) Contemporary animators however, do seem to regard her as important inspiration just look at Framestores The Tale of the Three Brothers adaptation for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1. A computer generated visualisation of shadow puppetry inspiration it wouldnt be unusual if they had thought of Lotte Reiniger when it came to producing it. A fairy-tale from J.K. Rowlings The Tales of Beedle the Bard in her final Potter book, which other animation direction would have been as fitting to show this tale

Fig. 4 Framestores Reiniger inspired work.

Bibliography
Kemp, Philip, (Unknown) screenonline.org.uk http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/528134/ (Accessed 21/03/2012) Mortiz, William, (1996) awn.com http://www.awn.com/mag/issue1.3/articles/moritz1.3.html (Accessed 21/03/2012) ONeill, Phelim, (2008) Lotte Reiniger- The Fairy Tale Films http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2008/nov/29/lotte-reiniger-fairy-tale-films (Accessed 21/03/2012)

List of Illustrations
Fig. 1. Lotte Reiniger. [Online image].On blogspot.com http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_C0gen0mKFz0/S3CugdLz9sI/AAAAAAAAAxA/qDQZRArmh9k/s400/achme dreiniger.jpg (Accessed 21/03/2012)

Fig. 2. The Adventures of Prince Achmed. [Online image].On mmas.unca.edu http://mmas.unca.edu:16080/~lhan/class/01-reiniger.jpg (Accessed 21/03/2012) Fig. 3. Cinderella. [Online image].On imagehost.org http://d.imagehost.org/0709/cinderellahand.png (Accessed 21/03/2012) Fig. 4. Framestores Reiniger inspired work. [Online image].On awn.com http://www.awn.com/files/imagepicker/35/3brothers01_brothers.jpg (Accessed 21/03/2012)