On Probation

Of all five stop motion shorts used in Aardman's early 80s series 'Conversation Pieces', 'On Probation' has probably aged the least gracefully. In spite of dealing with the most potentially powerful subject matter of the lot (the others dealt with door-to-door salesmen, holidays, early morning radio and tabloid newspapers) it isn't nearly as engaging as its four companion pieces (and definitely not as enjoyable). The situation, which, as any Aardman enthusiast might have guessed, was extracted from a real-life recording, is vaguely intriguing - an anxious youth named Steve is trying to persuade his probation officers to let him miss an upcoming meeting to go and see his brother in what could be his only chance for quite some time. I was genuinely curious to see how things would work out, but there was just something about it which kept me from getting completely involved, and from taking the short as a whole entirely seriously. I put a lot of it down to the animation and character designs, which score as the crudest in the line-up - granted, the techniques used in all the 'Conversation Pieces' are now looking a mite undated to some extent, but never quite as awkward and jerky as they come off in this one. You wouldn't really have to glance at the production dates to decipher that 'On Probation' was the first in the series - a prototype which Peter Lord and David Sproxton had fortunately figured out how to improve upon when they finally got round to the others. And whereas those that followed were rendered even more agreeable by the large number of pretty little sight gags which Lord and Sproxton had used to bring each of the conversations to life, 'On Probation' is pretty barren in that department for the most part, inserting no more than a handful of humorous happenings - which, given the subject matter, is understandable. But, for all the reasons mentioned above, it doesn't have the strength to carry itself on the merits of its topic alone.

Still, regardless of the rather jarring end result, it's clear that the animators at least tried to make things look as realistic and convincing as possible, with great attention going to the various physical mannerisms of the characters. The body language, rough as it may be, corresponds very nicely with the spoken words, and pays off most effectively with our protagonist Steve. With his slouching posture and wandering eye contact, he comes across as being somewhat sheepish and unsure of himself, earning some viewer sympathy and giving it a slightly emotional tinge. This is something which Peter Lord later perfected in 1987 with his poignant near-masterpiece 'Going Equipped' - I imagine that earlier projects like 'On Probation' served as more of a testing ground for this approach.

As Aardman goes, 'On Probation' is in with the more mediocre division - it isn't as fun or as easy (for unintentional reasons) to watch as the others of its kind, and I'll even admit to usually skipping this one when I'm giving the series a spin. But at the very least, the rudiments of a good claymation short are lurking in there somewhere, and it provided a good learning curve for later and better things.

Grade: B-

You're not missing anything if you skip this one. Animated short using the stop-motion technique. The characters seem to be made out of cardboard. Steve wants to take some time off, so he can see his brother. But he'll have to negotiate to get a few hours. Is it a comment on relations between workers and bosses? Not sure. It's not clear what's going on in that room with all those guys or what it is there doing for work. But at 5 minutes long, you don't have the impression that you've wasted a lot of time with this animated short.

Seen at home, in Toronto, on January 9th, 2005.

73/100 (**½)