STOP MOTION ANIMATED SHORT - 2019
Directed/Animation/Story/Cinematography/Editing/Set & Sound Design
Katrina Villarreal
Award winner: New York Animation Film Awards (NYAFA) Finalist: Cayenne Short Film Festival, Directed by Women Turkey.
National Board of Review (NBR) Grant. Semi-Finalist: Slovenia Film Festival
INSPIRATION/HISTORY
Free Spirit is a film about depression and the path that leads to suicide. Visually, I wanted to show a realistic dissection of a doll. Bringing themes of depression and suicide in, I
decided to have the dissection represent the process that leads to suicide, the loss of oneself. Each body part represents a part of her life. Her emotion - heart. Her intellect - brain.
And her spirit - soul. Each one she destroys represents a part of herself that she loses.
I shot this film over ten days. These were long days, lasting from 8-12 hours. I shot the film entirely by myself, setting up and putting down the set every day. Since I couldn’t fit my set in the stop motion room, I was given permission to shoot in the hallway of our animation floor. I had a lot of help and support from a professor at my school, Rob Benevides. His wife gave me the toner doll that starred in my film. Rob helped me create the organ props in the film and other things.
I love this film. It’s still my favorite thing I have created. I feel I really did put everything I had into it. My heart, mind, and soul. And now it lives on with a life of its own.
