La vendetta del cineoperatore

'The Cameraman's Revenge (1912)' is a delight. It's over a hundred years old, but it still holds up as a genuinely entertaining and impressive piece. It's a stop-motion short film that uses dead bugs as puppets. As morbid as that is, it's also really inventive. It helps that the animation is really good, packed with plenty of small details that make its characters feel alive. That's even more special when you consider that this was one of the first stop-motion films ever released. The picture is entertaining right the way through, even if it is a tad slow in places, and it has a wicked sense of dry humour that made me laugh on more than one occasion. Most of its humour comes from the dichotomy between its story and its aesthetics; it's a film about infidelity and its cast is entirely composed of posthumously animated insects. There's nothing fantastical about its narrative at all, which is why it's so intriguing and, in an almost odd way, funny. The bugs drive cars, they live in houses, they have jobs, they paint pictures, they go to clubs, they watch movies, they use cameras, they have spouses (which they cheat on), they enact vengeance, they brawl and they make out (and, yes, seeing this is as exactly as strange as you'd think it would be). It's so bizarre that these bugs live ordinary lives and make the same mistakes as us humans; this is where its comedy comes from. It's keenly aware of its uncanny nature and takes full advantage of it. It's incredibly charming overall. It's enjoyable, funny and impressive. It's a real treat. 8/10.