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I Space | Alumni Interview | CRCE

ALUMNI INTERVIEW — May/June 2005


By Susan K. Mumm

Image from the film "Ryan"

"These," the character says, pointing to bright scratches of color lining one side of his face, "are from October 1989, when my unbridled romantic worldview was permanently shattered."

He moves on to the other side of his head. It's caved in, and peering out from the crater is a frayed and stringy-looking smiley face. "This," he says, "is from September 1982, when I underwent a catastrophic loss of my ability to organize my finances in any meaningful way." As he talks, the smiley face shatters and screams.

Landreth's character continues, "But, before all that, I took on a paralyzing, self-defeating, all-pervading dread of personal failure, October 1963, age 2." Here, bright strings of color explode from the character's head, band together, then wrap themselves like a strait jacket around his adult face and, in the next frame, around his face as a crying toddler.

"But I'm getting off the subject here, I'm afraid," he concludes. "This story is about Ryan."

Landreth's cryptic references to his own personal setbacks create both the appearance and mood of a 14-minute film that earned him the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film this year, as well as more than 40 other honors. His story gives a glimpse of the rise and fall of Canadian animator Ryan Larkin, one of the most innovative filmmakers of the late '60s and early '70s, and a personal hero of Landreth's.

"I met Ryan in 2000 at an animated film festival where we were asked to be on a selection committee together," Landreth said. "I got to know him over that week and thought, 'What an incredible story his life is!'"

It was one Landreth felt compelled to tell — fittingly — through Larkin's own chosen medium. Unlike Larkin, though, Landreth's journey to animation came not through the conventional path of sketches and drawings etched for years throughout childhood and adulthood. Rather, his art came by way of science.

Growing up in the Chicago suburb of Northbrook, Landreth entered the University of Illinois 20 years ago to major in general engineering. He was attracted to the department's focus on fundamentals. That same philosophy drew him to theoretical and applied mechanics, in which he earned his master's degree in 1986.

"I knew of the work of Ron Adrian [professor emeritus of theoretical and applied mechanics] and knew that he was doing some stuff that was really, really cool in experimental fluid mechanics," Landreth recalled. Adrian's work involved measurements in fluid mechanics, which is the study of the physical behavior of fluids. Effectively showing those measurements was where Landreth came in.

Landreth

"To be able to present (Adrian's) data to peers and an audience, you had to visualize the data," Landreth said. "I did a lot of that work on the computer, and that was my jump from fluid mechanics to animation."

Said Adrian, "I used to joke that after our new computer arrived, all I ever saw was the back of Chris's head because he was always facing the screen of the terminal. He really did enjoy making the computer perform, and it was quickly apparent that his true talents lie with programming more than physical experiments."

After earning his master's degree, Landreth worked as Adrian's research assistant for three years until March 1990. While on campus, Landreth became acquainted with Donna Cox, an art professor whose work at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications had a huge influence on Landreth's later career.

"I was never employed (at NCSA)," he said. "It was Donna that allowed me to squat there." In 1990, Landreth helped Cox produce the animated short film, "Venus & Milo."

Top photo: ©2004 Copper Heart and the National Film Board of Canada
Bottom photo by: Shira Avni