If you'd like to support the channel you can check out my Patreon: www.patreon.com/EvanChester or donate here: Venmo @Evan-Chester Or www.paypal.me/EvanChester Slight correction, the title and year in the captions at 3:16 are incorrect.
Can you do South Korean animated cinema? Seems like most people only talk about North Korean animated cinema, Pucca or Boondocks, curious if you'd find more :> . p.s. love your videos!!
I still hope you can do a Argentinian animation video. As a suggestion of argentinian animations to check out, I recommend you the film "Anima Buenos Aires" (2012), an antology of four animated shorts from different artists and animators from Argentina (such as Caloi, Carlos Nine, Juan Pablo Zaramella, Pablo Rodriguez Jauregui, etc).
As someone from former yugoslavia it's extremely surprising to see so much anti-consumerism, anti-war and pro inviduality messages in yugoslav animation. EX yugo countries today are extremely nationalist, consumerist and conservative
So much of the economy was structured along communitarian and collective lines, it makes sense that anti-war and non-consumerist attitudes would grow out of that.
Why is it surprising? Yugoslavia was a progressive, socialist country proud of its independence and dedication to a peaceful "third way" of existence, eschewing the bellicose propaganda of the superpowers. As for the garbage neoliberal banana countries that rose on its corpse, there's nothing to say... I hope the chauvinist monsters enjoy what they have wrought.
We also had more musicians, painters, architects, everything basically. Now everyone is moving to the west because our economies have failed them. The nationalists want to erase that part of history because they don't want people to remember how good they really had it.
Yugoslavian animated film directors in the 60´s were really like "So I was thinking of this movie which would be an allegory for war and about how oppressive our modern society is"
I met Marušić at an airport in 2018. He remembered me because he was in the film festival jury that had awarded my own animation short in the young creators category. He was very friendly and mentorly, giving me advice I still carry to this day, and schooled me a bit in the history of Zagreb animation, to which I was quite ignorant at the time (and he the leading professor at the university's animation and new media masters programme). I still think about that, and the random chance of us meeting at that airport. The movie he seemed most proud of was Riblje Oko. Apparently he'd also made a feature film, though he promosed to never do it again. Ha.
meeting a master of your own field, part of your own country's history in that field and getting a chance at talking with him and sharing wisdom must be like a dream come true for many, really amazing that you had that opportunity
As a fan of Genndy Tartakovsky (creator of Dexter’s lab and Samurai Jack) it’s so cool to discover one of the goldmines of an animation tradition that he drew inspiration from
Balthazar is still showed on Finnish television today so it's only Yugoslavian animation I know (beside The Elm-enchanted Forest). So it's cool to see other animation from there.
I love how these cartoons gave the UPA style a more cartoonishly abstract look. Something that many cartoons and those PBS Kids bumpers would later have.
@@Sir.light1 yep, and it's horrible how relatively unknown the studio still is! had to make the unfortunate experience of overhearing a self-proclaimed "anime expert" say early anime was "bootleg Disney" when, in fact, it's visibly UPAs influence showing
Love how well maintained the RUclips channel for Zagreb Film is. Would love to have explained how it compares it to its other Central and Eastern European contemporaries.
While they don't post much animation as far as I know, Mosfilm has a pretty cool yt channel, they've posted lots of films including some really well known ones with translations. I've watched Stalker, Come and See, Dersu Uzala among others on their channel - all excellent films.
@@mjstecyk Mosfilm is not an animation studio, of course they don't post animation. You should look at Soyuzmultfilm instead. Although I've just checked their channel out and it's all their modern day productions, not the classics.
I'm a Croat, and I fully, absolutely, highly commend your pronunciation of the various Croatian names and sounds (č, ć, ž, š, đ). Of course, "lj" and "nj" aren't quite on, but those are rarely known anyway.. Regardless, Kudos/Svaka Čast 👌👍
Excellent! I was fairly familiar with Soviet and Czech animators but didn't know much of anything about the Yugoslav industry. I'm hoping to get to Zagreb and then down to Trogir this summer, to explore some family history.
I am so glad we still have great animation here in Croatia. We have two great cartoons made for kids on the national tv channel 3: Krceki and Juhuhu owl, they have great messages and a special song at the end of each episode. Amazing that our kids can still grow up with Croatian cartoons, new and old ❤
I'm very glad Yugoslavias rich film history is getting some attention! I would love a video on Yugoslav (black) comedies (including the black wave movement) as well. Cheers from Belgrade!
The cartoon "Surrogate" (Ersatz and The Substitute) in 1962 was the first cartoon outside the USA to win an Oscar, and the credit certainly goes to Dušan Vukotić. Yugoslav animation, especially Zagreb Film started from Soviet style to almost a mixture of classic Disney and folk ornamentation from Eastern Europe and I really enjoyed them as a child. Although Baltazar is my favorite Zagreb cartoon, I still liked the movies "The Wonderful Forest" and "The Wizard's Hat" the most, especially "The Wizard's Hat" where you have a fight against the total ice order established by Emperor Mr. Frost (the music of that composition was composed by Kornelije Kovač). It is a great pity that the war followed and that film did not reach the general public and that it was not dubbed into English, but for me that film is the greatest rise of Yugoslav and Croatian animation. After that comes Hlapić (Lapitch) and the decline of Croatian animation (the last one by Croatia Film was Good night Croatia), which can be seen all over the country. As for Serbian animation, I can't think of anything except Serbian Jet Set and Serbian folk tales in two episodes, but there are quality animators and artists there, the problem is finances who couldn't realize their ideas. Certainly, these are only examples of animation in the territory of the former Yugoslavia. Certainly, an excellent critique and explanation related to it.
In the 80's, a studio in Belgrade made a short were Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet was played by monsters. ruclips.net/video/tYc18V2Lflk/видео.htmlsi=j-_siVR_Z8UKlziY
Nikola Majdak (1927-2013) was a pioneering Serbian animator. His charming 1963 short 'Solista' has been uploaded at least of couple of times onto RUclips.
If you're interested in Serbian animation you could (among other things) check out works by Rastko Ćirić, an animator and multimedia artist who founded the animation department at the Belgrade academy of applied arts.
Awesome video man! I grew up with Professor Baltazar even tho im 18 years old because it was my grandmas favorite cartoon. Even now when I hear the intro the nostalgia overwhelms me.
The stylistic look of the abstraction minimal backgrounds and dramatic animation with pose popping, and cartoon logic have definitely inspired so many cartoons like the pink panther, the ant and the anteater, some of looney toons designs and is quite unique.
Now we want Czech/Czechoslovakian/ Slovakian animation video, with Jiri Trnka and Jan Svankmajer. And maybe, after that, one about Poland Will be Just good for completing the Eastern Block Animation video series
Old slavic animation fascinates me, I'm happy this video exists to inform me more about this. I hope this video gets a lot more views than it currently does as I type, this is a great video and I feel more people should know about this.
For anyone that wants to read more about Yugoslav animation, I would want to recommend the book 'Propaganda, Ideology, Animation. Twisted Dreams of History' from 2019. It dedicates a whole section to Yugoslavia, with two chapters focusing on the Zagreb School of animation and the lesser-known struggles of Serbian animation respectively. The section on Zagreb was even written by one of the animations mentioned in this video, the Bosnian animator Midhat Ajanović. I'll also take the opportunity to remind everyone that much of this video is focused on shorts. In terms of the lived-in experience of watching animation growing up in Yugoslavia, there was an immensely diverse mix, though this depended on where you were in the country. For the most part however, many kids in former Yugoslavia had the opportunity to grow up with animation icons from both West and East, whether it be the Looney Tunes and Scooby Doo, or Nu Pogodi and Bolek and Lolek.
I love the visual quality of these animated classics as well. And this was all hand-drawn cel animation, no computer graphics or CGI to use back then. There was an artisanal quality to this work that has been largely lost today, and helps make these little filmic gems so special.
Vatroslav Mimica was also a phenomenal feature film director. Unfortunately, there is too little interest in this cinema abroad, and too few resources in ex-Yugoslav countries for a proper restoration effort.
I grew up watching Balthazar! I showed it to a friend as a grown-up, she thought it was "smoked up", meaning it looked like someone was high making it.
One of the Yugoslavian animations that I saw when I was a kid in the earlier 2010's was "Cudesna suma". I loved that movie and forgot about it for so many years. Thanks, man, for reminding me of it.
Thank you so much for making those animation guide videos, so many of those works are criminally underrated, it's very nice to see someone put so much care in talking about them!
Thank you very much for this. I appreciate in particular the effort you have taken to pronounce names correctly, this is vanishingly rare, especially as you do a practically perfect job! Just one small correction--Zlatko Bourek's last name is pronounced Bow-rek--both the o and u are sounded separately, and not Boorek (like the cheese pastry).
You can listen to the whole Professor Balhazar soundtrack here ruclips.net/video/ZVC0lMa_d5I/видео.html and The Zagreb School of Animated Film ruclips.net/video/QSiwxXU3gsQ/видео.html Tomislav Simovic composed both Professor Balthazar and did soundtracks for quite a few Zagreb film animated films. Both were released recently by Fox & His Friends Records recently and are available on vinyl and all streaming platforms.
I'm 50+ Pole and find it very interesting. I knew almost nothing about Yugoslavian animated films of that era - and they are great. Would love to a video comparison of the all post-soviet animation artists. If you wanna taste Poland's one I would suggest the works of Julian Antonisz.
My parents grew up watching Professor Balthazar, and I'm so glad somebody talked about this part of Yugoslav cinema. I also wish more people knew about the amazing movies outside of animation, like the ones by Kusturica, Makavejev, Paskaljević, Šijan, Kovačević...
Thank you @Kubricklynch for this video ! I grew up in Albania (and partially in Kosovo) and I've seen some of them. However, most post-Yugoslovian war cartoons came from Russia (such as Nu Pogodi). I'd love to see 'A Beginner's Guide to Czhekoslovakian Animation' next time. ❤
Es ist sooo gut!❤ nicht zu fassen was für tolle Sachen produziert wurden...neben dem einheits-müll der heutzutage serviert wird ist das reines Gold!❤❤❤
I saw Professor Baltazar in thumbnail and I quickly clicked on it because I remember watching that cartoon when I was a kid. Nice guide and love from Croatia 🇭🇷
Thanks, this has been a quiet intresting video! I've been curious the last 5 years or so of what none American cartoons were like. I wish it was easier to find.
THANK YOU FOR THIS ! ive recently fallen in love with Baltazar as someone who lives where Yugoslavia used 2 be and the coloring style of the cartoon is taking over my coloring style so all my art is like vibrant and shit and im glad to have gotten to know more about this animation era and have even more inspo now :D
Thanks of this. I'm huge fan of Zagreb and Praga anime schools (legendary A je to and Lolek&Bolek from Praga anime school are out of this world funny, pure joy). Many of their masterpieces shaped my childhood and teenage age. Zagreb school is one of best and most unique anime schools in world, I find it brilliant. Also most "arthouse" imho, in comparison to other influential anime schools in World. I wasn't following it since too many years, but you encouraged me to do so. Thank you, and Happy new Year. P.S. Thanks for mentioning dr. Balthasar, I love this anime endlessly. Just to mention that also Hungarians and Italians back in 70ies- 1990s produced really interesting and magnigicent anime masterpieces worthy of attention. Waiting for part 3.
Amazing animation and a great video! So a refreshing subject! A great channel on the whole - subscribed! You have many interesting videos to see, great work!
What an exciting, broad introduction to this rich heritage of animation! Many names and titles here were new to me, and I appreciated how you made mention also of animation produced in centers other than Zagreb. Animation and shorts unfortunately tend to be overlooked in film histories, but focusing on these forms makes clear that Yugoslavia was one of the most vibrant and creative crucibles of cinema in the second half of the twentieth century. Indeed, I think the only other country that rivaled it in the arena of animated shorts during that period was Canada, and in both instances strong state investment in the art coupled with considerable creative license for the artists was foundational for these successes. While Yugoslav production was exemplary in so many ways, Eastern European animation in general constitutes a wonderful cultural heritage, and I would welcome further explorations in those national cinemas I don't believe have yet received their own episodes here, such as Poland, the former Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria.
@@timojarun7830 Well it's on the eastern half of the continent. Not that it matters because the only countries there that the West(tm) can name are Poland,Greece,Russia,& recently Ukraine.
Wow, coming from Latvia it's amazing to see how interesting and creative Yugoslavian animation was, honestly I've always kind of hated old latvian animations 😅 Both in style and content. These are really cool.
In 1986 i watched Alien 2 in theater ,was still kid,movie was awsome but it scared me ,so tomorrow i went and watched "Cudesna suma" to return me in my childhood life
4:39 This is exactly how the cars in Power Puff Girls are animated. This shot just screams "the city of townsville" to me. 8:52 and this is very much like Terry Gilliams animated segments in Monty Pythons flying circus.
The most important part of Yugoslav animation is that its popularity and impressiveness among the general public came crashing down in 1978 when RAI started airing Grendizer in Italy. Anyone who could receive Italian TV (aka most of the coast) tossed Baltazar immediately, once they saw giant-ass robots. Once private TV stations started broadcasting in Italy, the floodgates for anime opened. By 1984 RAI quit airing anime, but all that anime was then rerun on private TV stations. And for those who wanted darker themes, there was Tiger Mask and Hokuto no Ken. Needless to say, landlubbers from the mainland were quite jealous over their coastal counterparts with access to Italian TV.
To be fair, while Baltazar is a TV show too, anime shows were a completely different market to most of these. Most of these are theatrical shorts meant primarily for festivals (maybe shown before some Zagreb film feature films??), not for television.
Wow, I was born in 1995 in a latin country. I don’t think we had many of these. My mom did know about Mr Magoo. But I can see that these characters with big noses and small bodies influenced many cartoons, like the Pink Panther. And also the backgrounds are very similar to Rocky and Bullwinkle.
I immiediately think Ren & Stimpy, Sheep in the big city, POwerpuffgirls, omg, somuch of cartoonnetwork now that i think of it. I loved discovering this. Thank you for sharing this. I loved it.
Ante Zaninovic was a high profile chauvinist from croatia. My grandfather was a step in professor for Ljubo in the arts school in Zagreb and he overheard him yell really disgusting things against Serbs. Even though he was born and raised AND PAID FOR by a local government in Serbia. :) Just saying.
No matter what,Yugoslavia would never be the same without Tito...the country was an utopia for the everyday man,since it wasn't as soulles or as exploitative as todays Capitalism or todays Dictatorial Communism like in Russia or China...Yugoslavia was a thing of it's own and should have stayed so...more collectivist and made for the people by the people imstead of wartorn and destroyed like it's today... Even if I've not been born during Yugos period,but right after the war...I'm kinda symphatizing for the days before the war,since I dislike how the people from ex-yugo countries don't see eachother as equals,are more nationalist than they wpuld have been... In other words...I'd have LOVED if I were born in a fully functional,prosphwr country,rather than a wartorn rubble the war had caused...with no hope of future in sight for any of us,just because of some vulgar people who'd now gotten rich off our collective suffering and somehow now are the leaders of our countries... Wish everything had gone differently and that our corner of the world had stayed brorhers and NOT "enemies" (for the lack of a better term),who won't be able to see eye to eye for the near future and will stay resentful because of the nationalist propagandas spewed from the mentioned corrupt leaders who're tending to divide us more and more and also keeping us all poor instead of having them removed and replaced with people who could try to make everything work and get us all out of the pit we all had dug because of the NEEDLESS WAR WICH COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED IF THE PEOPLE HAD ONLY TRIED TO UNDERSTAND EACHOTHER AND CONSIDERED DOING THE DEPARTURE MORE PEACEFULLY AND UNDERSTANDABLY...WHICH COUKD HAVE LEFT OUR COU TRIES INTACT AND MORE COOPERATIVE THAN TODAY! Hereby I'd like to greet you all and would hope that at least some of you understand how because of the NEEDLESS war and the NEEDLES h8 our countries have now lost the ability to use their potential they had... I hope that someday everything might get cleared and that we all would stand on the same side as brothers and cooperate more than during the days of Yugoslavia... I know it's wishful thinking but I'm sick and tired of having seen and read so much about how it was for it to have ended up destroyed and hopeless like it's today...and I h8 living here even if I LOVE our corner of the world...I'm just dissapointed at how we all were just to blind to see what the qar would and already had NEELDESSLY caused...
If you'd like to support the channel you can check out my Patreon:
www.patreon.com/EvanChester
or donate here: Venmo @Evan-Chester
Or www.paypal.me/EvanChester
Slight correction, the title and year in the captions at 3:16 are incorrect.
Can you do South Korean animated cinema? Seems like most people only talk about North Korean animated cinema, Pucca or Boondocks, curious if you'd find more :> . p.s. love your videos!!
I still hope you can do a Argentinian animation video. As a suggestion of argentinian animations to check out, I recommend you the film "Anima Buenos Aires" (2012), an antology of four animated shorts from different artists and animators from Argentina (such as Caloi, Carlos Nine, Juan Pablo Zaramella, Pablo Rodriguez Jauregui, etc).
Can you do a guide to the digital animation films?
Very cool
old vietnameese animation ?
OMG, Professor Balthazar in the thumbnail! I recognised him instantly after not seeing him for nearly half a century
As someone from former yugoslavia it's extremely surprising to see so much anti-consumerism, anti-war and pro inviduality messages in yugoslav animation. EX yugo countries today are extremely nationalist, consumerist and conservative
Maybe artists back then weren't conformists.
Better than it would be communist, totalitarist, and non-consummist because there was NOTHING to consumme!
So much of the economy was structured along communitarian and collective lines, it makes sense that anti-war and non-consumerist attitudes would grow out of that.
Why is it surprising? Yugoslavia was a progressive, socialist country proud of its independence and dedication to a peaceful "third way" of existence, eschewing the bellicose propaganda of the superpowers. As for the garbage neoliberal banana countries that rose on its corpse, there's nothing to say... I hope the chauvinist monsters enjoy what they have wrought.
We also had more musicians, painters, architects, everything basically. Now everyone is moving to the west because our economies have failed them. The nationalists want to erase that part of history because they don't want people to remember how good they really had it.
Yugoslavian animated film directors in the 60´s were really like "So I was thinking of this movie which would be an allegory for war and about how oppressive our modern society is"
Being next door to the Soviet Bloc probably gave them reason to make these statements.
I met Marušić at an airport in 2018. He remembered me because he was in the film festival jury that had awarded my own animation short in the young creators category. He was very friendly and mentorly, giving me advice I still carry to this day, and schooled me a bit in the history of Zagreb animation, to which I was quite ignorant at the time (and he the leading professor at the university's animation and new media masters programme). I still think about that, and the random chance of us meeting at that airport. The movie he seemed most proud of was Riblje Oko. Apparently he'd also made a feature film, though he promosed to never do it again. Ha.
Wow that’s awesome!
meeting a master of your own field, part of your own country's history in that field and getting a chance at talking with him and sharing wisdom must be like a dream come true for many, really amazing that you had that opportunity
What sort of...aesthetic would you call this?
As a fan of Genndy Tartakovsky (creator of Dexter’s lab and Samurai Jack) it’s so cool to discover one of the goldmines of an animation tradition that he drew inspiration from
I didn't know that Genndy was inspired by Yugoslav animation, but watching it I can tell.
Check out ex YU new wave and punk if you r into it...
@@tompanoname3579 bull's eye
I grew up watching Professor Baltazar, so it is very interesting to actually find out about the history of the Yugoslavian animation.
Holy shit, this just unlocked a core memory of me watching episodes of Professor Balthazar on vhs tapes. I had no idea it was from Yugoslavia!
Balthazar is still showed on Finnish television today so it's only Yugoslavian animation I know (beside The Elm-enchanted Forest). So it's cool to see other animation from there.
Whaaaaat? You watch Baltazar up north?
We have mumines on TV, as well
I love how these cartoons gave the UPA style a more cartoonishly abstract look.
Something that many cartoons and those PBS Kids bumpers would later have.
Indeed, it's crazy how influential the UPA style was on animation from then on. Cartoon Network's early original works had that as well
@@Sir.light1 yep, and it's horrible how relatively unknown the studio still is!
had to make the unfortunate experience of overhearing a self-proclaimed "anime expert" say early anime was "bootleg Disney" when, in fact, it's visibly UPAs influence showing
Love how well maintained the RUclips channel for Zagreb Film is. Would love to have explained how it compares it to its other Central and Eastern European contemporaries.
While they don't post much animation as far as I know, Mosfilm has a pretty cool yt channel, they've posted lots of films including some really well known ones with translations. I've watched Stalker, Come and See, Dersu Uzala among others on their channel - all excellent films.
@@mjstecyk Mosfilm is not an animation studio, of course they don't post animation. You should look at Soyuzmultfilm instead. Although I've just checked their channel out and it's all their modern day productions, not the classics.
I'm a Croat, and I fully, absolutely, highly commend your pronunciation of the various Croatian names and sounds (č, ć, ž, š, đ). Of course, "lj" and "nj" aren't quite on, but those are rarely known anyway..
Regardless,
Kudos/Svaka Čast 👌👍
Excellent! I was fairly familiar with Soviet and Czech animators but didn't know much of anything about the Yugoslav industry. I'm hoping to get to Zagreb and then down to Trogir this summer, to explore some family history.
Zagreb is still home to an animation festival held annually...
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animafest_Zagreb
I am so glad we still have great animation here in Croatia. We have two great cartoons made for kids on the national tv channel 3: Krceki and Juhuhu owl, they have great messages and a special song at the end of each episode. Amazing that our kids can still grow up with Croatian cartoons, new and old ❤
I'm very glad Yugoslavias rich film history is getting some attention! I would love a video on Yugoslav (black) comedies (including the black wave movement) as well. Cheers from Belgrade!
I watched a lot of Professor Balthazar in my youth. Thank you for sharing this awesome video.
They used to play those on Nickelodeon 40 years ago.
God every single clip you show is just so eye catching, they practically had this style MASTERED by the late 50s
Thank you for sparking my interest for Croatian animation. I myself am Croatian and I knew, sadly, very little about it. The video is fantastic!
The cartoon "Surrogate" (Ersatz and The Substitute) in 1962 was the first cartoon outside the USA to win an Oscar, and the credit certainly goes to Dušan Vukotić. Yugoslav animation, especially Zagreb Film started from Soviet style to almost a mixture of classic Disney and folk ornamentation from Eastern Europe and I really enjoyed them as a child. Although Baltazar is my favorite Zagreb cartoon, I still liked the movies "The Wonderful Forest" and "The Wizard's Hat" the most, especially "The Wizard's Hat" where you have a fight against the total ice order established by Emperor Mr. Frost (the music of that composition was composed by Kornelije Kovač). It is a great pity that the war followed and that film did not reach the general public and that it was not dubbed into English, but for me that film is the greatest rise of Yugoslav and Croatian animation. After that comes Hlapić (Lapitch) and the decline of Croatian animation (the last one by Croatia Film was Good night Croatia), which can be seen all over the country.
As for Serbian animation, I can't think of anything except Serbian Jet Set and Serbian folk tales in two episodes, but there are quality animators and artists there, the problem is finances who couldn't realize their ideas. Certainly, these are only examples of animation in the territory of the former Yugoslavia. Certainly, an excellent critique and explanation related to it.
I totally forgot about Jet Set! That's a fantastic short film, it's basically Serbian South Park.
Technotise: Edit and I (2009)
In the 80's, a studio in Belgrade made a short were Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet was played by monsters.
ruclips.net/video/tYc18V2Lflk/видео.htmlsi=j-_siVR_Z8UKlziY
Nikola Majdak (1927-2013) was a pioneering Serbian animator. His charming 1963 short 'Solista' has been uploaded at least of couple of times onto RUclips.
If you're interested in Serbian animation you could (among other things) check out works by Rastko Ćirić, an animator and multimedia artist who founded the animation department at the Belgrade academy of applied arts.
Awesome video man! I grew up with Professor Baltazar even tho im 18 years old because it was my grandmas favorite cartoon. Even now when I hear the intro the nostalgia overwhelms me.
Same, takoder odrasla na Cudesnoj Sumi i Craobnjakovom sesiru. Hlapica nisam gledala sve do nedavno though.
Yeah it’s always been popular in Sweden so it’s nostalgic for me too
Thank you/ Hvala from Croatia ❤
The stylistic look of the abstraction minimal backgrounds and dramatic animation with pose popping, and cartoon logic have definitely inspired so many cartoons like the pink panther, the ant and the anteater, some of looney toons designs and is quite unique.
Now we want Czech/Czechoslovakian/ Slovakian animation video, with Jiri Trnka and Jan Svankmajer. And maybe, after that, one about Poland Will be Just good for completing the Eastern Block Animation video series
I would add Romania and Bulgaria as well to round out Eastern Europe's exceptionally rich heritage of animation.
If you could add on the earliest of each country's animation, too, that would be wonderful. (I believe Czech animation started in the silent era.)
Hungary too, Gusztav deserves a mention
oh wow, there's already one
Old slavic animation fascinates me, I'm happy this video exists to inform me more about this. I hope this video gets a lot more views than it currently does as I type, this is a great video and I feel more people should know about this.
Great video. From Macedonia. Former Yugoslavia. Such a nostalgia😊
For anyone that wants to read more about Yugoslav animation, I would want to recommend the book 'Propaganda, Ideology, Animation. Twisted Dreams of History' from 2019. It dedicates a whole section to Yugoslavia, with two chapters focusing on the Zagreb School of animation and the lesser-known struggles of Serbian animation respectively. The section on Zagreb was even written by one of the animations mentioned in this video, the Bosnian animator Midhat Ajanović.
I'll also take the opportunity to remind everyone that much of this video is focused on shorts. In terms of the lived-in experience of watching animation growing up in Yugoslavia, there was an immensely diverse mix, though this depended on where you were in the country. For the most part however, many kids in former Yugoslavia had the opportunity to grow up with animation icons from both West and East, whether it be the Looney Tunes and Scooby Doo, or Nu Pogodi and Bolek and Lolek.
That's why I say those in the former Yugoslavia had the best of both worlds.
They really don't make stuff like this anymore. I am in love with the styles of the shorts from Zagreb film!
I love the visual quality of these animated classics as well. And this was all hand-drawn cel animation, no computer graphics or CGI to use back then. There was an artisanal quality to this work that has been largely lost today, and helps make these little filmic gems so special.
This brings me back, I used to watch Baltazar when I was very little, as a matter of fact, I probably have the CD lying around somewhere...
Its amazing how experimental so many of these films are. Id love a more in depth look at these directors!!
Vatroslav Mimica was also a phenomenal feature film director. Unfortunately, there is too little interest in this cinema abroad, and too few resources in ex-Yugoslav countries for a proper restoration effort.
Reminded Dusan Vukotic even made a live action sci-fi flick... ruclips.net/video/-3azjxDMLg0/видео.htmlsi=l2tLHhk8N303L5Tj
I never thought i would hear Miki Muster's name outside of slovenian media but its really cool that you mentioned him:)
I remember seeing a bunch of Zagreb films on a PBS show (hosted by Jean Marsh) that came on right after Monty Python back in 77 or 78
Balthazar is on tubi at the moment, pls watch before it disappears!
I grew up watching Balthazar! I showed it to a friend as a grown-up, she thought it was "smoked up", meaning it looked like someone was high making it.
This is very interesting. So many of these animated films are more an extension of visual art then film/drama/entertainment.
I see some DePatie/Freleng Pink Panther in a lot of these... what a fabulous find! Thank you for such a fascinating upload; very inspirational!!
One of the Yugoslavian animations that I saw when I was a kid in the earlier 2010's was "Cudesna suma". I loved that movie and forgot about it for so many years. Thanks, man, for reminding me of it.
I'm from Serbia but I only knew Balthazar from this list. I'm going to watch some of these movies for sure
Along with his animations, Miki Muster is also fondly remembered in Slovenia because of his comics (Zvitorepec especially)
After a long time man. I really love your videos. I always look forward to them. Keep going man
This channel is so retrospectively awesome,
you deserve a new subscriber from
Vantaa, Finland 🇫🇮.
😺👍
Thank you so much for making those animation guide videos, so many of those works are criminally underrated, it's very nice to see someone put so much care in talking about them!
Wow, I was not born back then, didn't know we had such profound animations
Props to you 👏🏻 👏🏻 👏🏻
That was very interesting to watch.
Great! Greets from Zagreb!
Thank you very much for this. I appreciate in particular the effort you have taken to pronounce names correctly, this is vanishingly rare, especially as you do a practically perfect job! Just one small correction--Zlatko Bourek's last name is pronounced Bow-rek--both the o and u are sounded separately, and not Boorek (like the cheese pastry).
Thanks for the tip!
Watch out, you might anger a Bosnian for calling burek a cheese pastry
You can listen to the whole Professor Balhazar soundtrack here ruclips.net/video/ZVC0lMa_d5I/видео.html and The Zagreb School of Animated Film ruclips.net/video/QSiwxXU3gsQ/видео.html Tomislav Simovic composed both Professor Balthazar and did soundtracks for quite a few Zagreb film animated films. Both were released recently by Fox & His Friends Records recently and are available on vinyl and all streaming platforms.
Thank you for this. The member of Zagreb School was also Tomislav Simovic and many other composers.
Finnaly. I am glad to see someone covering my countries animation history.
I'm 50+ Pole and find it very interesting. I knew almost nothing about Yugoslavian animated films of that era - and they are great. Would love to a video comparison of the all post-soviet animation artists. If you wanna taste Poland's one I would suggest the works of Julian Antonisz.
Just catching up on all these videos I missed recently, so well researched and really really amazing man! You should be proud
Thanks a ton!
My parents grew up watching Professor Balthazar, and I'm so glad somebody talked about this part of Yugoslav cinema. I also wish more people knew about the amazing movies outside of animation, like the ones by Kusturica, Makavejev, Paskaljević, Šijan, Kovačević...
A Serb is Here. The Magician's Hat had the most baddas sog Car Mrazomor (the Emperor Frostkiller)
Finally someone who brings attention to this!!!
Glad to see this.
You did a great job!
Thanks!
thanks! now i want to watch all of them
dude I love these videos on lesser known animation scenes, keep it up!
I love animation but I have a lot to explore. I love that your videos cover new territories of cinema to discover. Keep up the great work!
Thank you!
Man I Remember Watching Most Of These As A Kid.
Thanks For Discussing About Yugoslavian Animation.
Which network did the cartoons aired?
Thank you @Kubricklynch for this video ! I grew up in Albania (and partially in Kosovo) and I've seen some of them.
However, most post-Yugoslovian war cartoons came from Russia (such as Nu Pogodi).
I'd love to see 'A Beginner's Guide to Czhekoslovakian Animation' next time.
❤
Yup I think Czechoslovakia will be next!
This was fantastic. I want to watch all of these, I'll have to come back and get the titles again!
Es ist sooo gut!❤ nicht zu fassen was für tolle Sachen produziert wurden...neben dem einheits-müll der heutzutage serviert wird ist das reines Gold!❤❤❤
I saw Professor Baltazar in thumbnail and I quickly clicked on it because I remember watching that cartoon when I was a kid.
Nice guide and love from Croatia 🇭🇷
Thank you! Balthazar is so cute.
Cartoon Network once adopted this art style for almost a decade
Fascinating vid, thank you!
Holy shit you just brought back my childhood
This is amazing, so glad to know this stuff exists, thank you!
Baltazar went so hard as a kid
I'm glad this channel exists. 😊
"The Devil's work" and "The Fly" - I watched both here in Brazil as a small kid, and thanks to this video I can rewatch them. Thanks! :)
Thanks, this has been a quiet intresting video! I've been curious the last 5 years or so of what none American cartoons were like. I wish it was easier to find.
American cartoons have gotten worse. It's why we like to see how our neighbors do now.
I had no idea yugoslavian animation was in a thing before this. Will definitely check out the stuff showed here. Thanks!
6:18 I remember watching this on Zimbabwe TV in the early 2000s.
Thank you! Very interesting video
THANK YOU FOR THIS ! ive recently fallen in love with Baltazar as someone who lives where Yugoslavia used 2 be and the coloring style of the cartoon is taking over my coloring style so all my art is like vibrant and shit and im glad to have gotten to know more about this animation era and have even more inspo now :D
Thanks of this. I'm huge fan of Zagreb and Praga anime schools (legendary A je to and Lolek&Bolek from Praga anime school are out of this world funny, pure joy). Many of their masterpieces shaped my childhood and teenage age. Zagreb school is one of best and most unique anime schools in world, I find it brilliant. Also most "arthouse" imho, in comparison to other influential anime schools in World. I wasn't following it since too many years, but you encouraged me to do so. Thank you, and Happy new Year.
P.S. Thanks for mentioning dr. Balthasar, I love this anime endlessly. Just to mention that also Hungarians and Italians back in 70ies- 1990s produced really interesting and magnigicent anime masterpieces worthy of attention. Waiting for part 3.
Amazing animation and a great video! So a refreshing subject! A great channel on the whole - subscribed! You have many interesting videos to see, great work!
Side note: your pronunciation of Yugoslavian names is amazing
One of my favorite Italian animated movies is Allegro non Troppo. It's weird and amazing. The animator also spoofs Disney's Fantasia.
What an exciting, broad introduction to this rich heritage of animation! Many names and titles here were new to me, and I appreciated how you made mention also of animation produced in centers other than Zagreb.
Animation and shorts unfortunately tend to be overlooked in film histories, but focusing on these forms makes clear that Yugoslavia was one of the most vibrant and creative crucibles of cinema in the second half of the twentieth century. Indeed, I think the only other country that rivaled it in the arena of animated shorts during that period was Canada, and in both instances strong state investment in the art coupled with considerable creative license for the artists was foundational for these successes.
While Yugoslav production was exemplary in so many ways, Eastern European animation in general constitutes a wonderful cultural heritage, and I would welcome further explorations in those national cinemas I don't believe have yet received their own episodes here, such as Poland, the former Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria.
Hi I just discovered your channel. It’s exactly what I am was looking for!
BALTAZAR!Oh wow I loved that cartoon!
Happy new year (from Croatia) to all those who know that East Europe ISN'T just Poland,Ukraine & Russia!
At least Yugoslavia never sided with Stalin and did its own thing.
Croatia si central-western Europe
Ceoatia is (south)Cemtral Europe. Not east.
@@timojarun7830 Well it's on the eastern half of the continent.
Not that it matters because the only countries there that the West(tm) can name are Poland,Greece,Russia,& recently Ukraine.
What is or isn't Eastern Europe is a matter of opinion.
Finally someone speaking about us.
Wow, coming from Latvia it's amazing to see how interesting and creative Yugoslavian animation was, honestly I've always kind of hated old latvian animations 😅 Both in style and content. These are really cool.
Amazing video!!
Here is a playlist of most of the films mentioned: ruclips.net/p/PLDobbN5l2nxwFcaE-Zku_NjNwnBAisEJ1&si=oJT2QoJ54vk57TtZ
That what I was looking for in the comments - thank you very much!
Thanx, I have loved seeing this.
In 1986 i watched Alien 2 in theater ,was still kid,movie was awsome but it scared me ,so tomorrow i went and watched "Cudesna suma" to return me in my childhood life
This is like a Yugoslavian version of Disney's Fantasia❤
They still show professor Balthazar on tv in finland rarely but still
4:39 This is exactly how the cars in Power Puff Girls are animated. This shot just screams "the city of townsville" to me.
8:52 and this is very much like Terry Gilliams animated segments in Monty Pythons flying circus.
Thank you for this video 👍
The most important part of Yugoslav animation is that its popularity and impressiveness among the general public came crashing down in 1978 when RAI started airing Grendizer in Italy. Anyone who could receive Italian TV (aka most of the coast) tossed Baltazar immediately, once they saw giant-ass robots. Once private TV stations started broadcasting in Italy, the floodgates for anime opened.
By 1984 RAI quit airing anime, but all that anime was then rerun on private TV stations. And for those who wanted darker themes, there was Tiger Mask and Hokuto no Ken. Needless to say, landlubbers from the mainland were quite jealous over their coastal counterparts with access to Italian TV.
I'm sure those living around Koper, Slovenia had it pretty lucky if they got to see the Italian stations near their town.
To be fair, while Baltazar is a TV show too, anime shows were a completely different market to most of these. Most of these are theatrical shorts meant primarily for festivals (maybe shown before some Zagreb film feature films??), not for television.
Thanks for making this! These look great.
FASCINATING.
Wow, I was born in 1995 in a latin country. I don’t think we had many of these. My mom did know about Mr Magoo. But I can see that these characters with big noses and small bodies influenced many cartoons, like the Pink Panther. And also the backgrounds are very similar to Rocky and Bullwinkle.
It looks like Dexter's lavatory & power puff were Inspired by this
Dusan Vukotic's Cow on the Moon had characters that felt like they'd fit in Dexter's Lab's world.
Love the videos, man. Keep it up!!!
I immiediately think Ren & Stimpy, Sheep in the big city, POwerpuffgirls, omg, somuch of cartoonnetwork now that i think of it. I loved discovering this. Thank you for sharing this. I loved it.
Ante Zaninovic was a high profile chauvinist from croatia. My grandfather was a step in professor for Ljubo in the arts school in Zagreb and he overheard him yell really disgusting things against Serbs. Even though he was born and raised AND PAID FOR by a local government in Serbia.
:)
Just saying.
Sad, but not surprising.
No matter what,Yugoslavia would never be the same without Tito...the country was an utopia for the everyday man,since it wasn't as soulles or as exploitative as todays Capitalism or todays Dictatorial Communism like in Russia or China...Yugoslavia was a thing of it's own and should have stayed so...more collectivist and made for the people by the people imstead of wartorn and destroyed like it's today...
Even if I've not been born during Yugos period,but right after the war...I'm kinda symphatizing for the days before the war,since I dislike how the people from ex-yugo countries don't see eachother as equals,are more nationalist than they wpuld have been...
In other words...I'd have LOVED if I were born in a fully functional,prosphwr country,rather than a wartorn rubble the war had caused...with no hope of future in sight for any of us,just because of some vulgar people who'd now gotten rich off our collective suffering and somehow now are the leaders of our countries...
Wish everything had gone differently and that our corner of the world had stayed brorhers and NOT "enemies" (for the lack of a better term),who won't be able to see eye to eye for the near future and will stay resentful because of the nationalist propagandas spewed from the mentioned corrupt leaders who're tending to divide us more and more and also keeping us all poor instead of having them removed and replaced with people who could try to make everything work and get us all out of the pit we all had dug because of the NEEDLESS WAR WICH COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED IF THE PEOPLE HAD ONLY TRIED TO UNDERSTAND EACHOTHER AND CONSIDERED DOING THE DEPARTURE MORE PEACEFULLY AND UNDERSTANDABLY...WHICH COUKD HAVE LEFT OUR COU TRIES INTACT AND MORE COOPERATIVE THAN TODAY!
Hereby I'd like to greet you all and would hope that at least some of you understand how because of the NEEDLESS war and the NEEDLES h8 our countries have now lost the ability to use their potential they had...
I hope that someday everything might get cleared and that we all would stand on the same side as brothers and cooperate more than during the days of Yugoslavia...
I know it's wishful thinking but I'm sick and tired of having seen and read so much about how it was for it to have ended up destroyed and hopeless like it's today...and I h8 living here even if I LOVE our corner of the world...I'm just dissapointed at how we all were just to blind to see what the qar would and already had NEELDESSLY caused...
Thank you, recommended.
I'm really good I found this channel. I've never seen these histories.