WEBVTT 00:00:00.050 --> 00:00:18.230 ♪ 00:00:18.250 --> 00:00:22.410 Kind of a nice thing... 00:00:29.998 --> 00:00:36.553 [Experiment #001--Lips] 00:00:36.553 --> 00:00:40.471 My name is Tommy Hartung. I make movies. 00:00:40.471 --> 00:00:42.861 [Tommy Hartung--Artist] 00:00:42.861 --> 00:00:47.360 And I live and work in Ridgewood, Queens. 00:00:47.380 --> 00:00:53.040 New York Close Up 00:01:00.825 --> 00:01:07.052 ["Tommy Hartung's Underground Movies"] 00:01:11.945 --> 00:01:15.370 I just moved into a new space this past summer. 00:01:17.570 --> 00:01:25.660 And I’ve really just been you know sitting in the space and thinking about what...what kind of space do I want to work in? 00:01:25.680 --> 00:01:29.750 ♪ 00:01:29.770 --> 00:01:36.750 I was talking to one of my friends and he called it an arena, the studio as like some kind of arena. 00:01:36.770 --> 00:01:44.930 And I really like that, as a sort of like this place where I’m just you know making a play as I’m making it, you know? And writing it. 00:01:44.950 --> 00:01:52.950 ♪ 00:01:52.970 --> 00:02:07.950 This is just raw footage. The storm. And then this is just a ball of plastic wrap maybe around the size of my hand. 00:02:07.970 --> 00:02:15.150 And this is just a...or, the clouds made out of battening, the stuff you stuff pillows with. 00:02:19.200 --> 00:02:22.330 [Experiment #002--Salt] 00:02:22.350 --> 00:02:24.017 Cue the salt. 00:02:38.860 --> 00:02:52.030 But you know a little...a lot of my planning is just sort of like these kind of experiments and like you know figuring out what the time and the sort of structure is. 00:03:05.050 --> 00:03:13.418 I use the...the filmmaking process to document this, you know me acting out these different ideas on objects or you know these little setups or maquettes or dioramas. 00:03:13.418 --> 00:03:21.250 [Experiment #003--Frog] 00:03:21.250 --> 00:03:32.220 NARRATOR: I would like to be able to tell you of transformation and change to cut deeply into the structure. 00:03:32.240 --> 00:03:45.633 But this here now is (INAUDIBLE). We have to touch. 00:03:45.665 --> 00:04:06.420 HARTUNG: I sort of latch on to some kind of external theme, you know. And then I just sort of use that as a structure conceptually and then whatever kind of set or theater that I create in my studio is like the sort of physical space for that idea. 00:04:06.440 --> 00:04:11.420 ♪ 00:04:11.440 --> 00:04:22.430 When we see something you know move, we want to think of it as maybe something is alive but in my movies it’s just typically not the case. 00:04:22.450 --> 00:04:29.600 ♪ 00:04:29.620 --> 00:04:34.790 I’m more interested in like some kind of dead cinema. 00:04:34.810 --> 00:04:39.790 ["The Story of Edward Holmes" (2008)] 00:04:39.810 --> 00:04:45.800 A lot of animation is describing some kind of real or lifelike situation. 00:04:45.820 --> 00:04:58.990 I’m sort of interested more in my characters or any humanesque subjects in the movie. I’m more interested in them being not believable. 00:04:59.010 --> 00:05:03.160 And what kind of illusion can you create out of that? 00:05:03.180 --> 00:05:09.121 [YELLING] 00:05:16.773 --> 00:05:21.967 [Experiment #004--Doll] 00:05:26.630 --> 00:05:32.640 A lot of the times I just sort of like to move just to touch it all over, just to figure out how I want it to move. 00:05:32.660 --> 00:05:44.830 ♪ 00:05:44.850 --> 00:05:50.830 But I generally like keeping objects open for a lot of different kinds of interpretations. 00:05:50.850 --> 00:05:58.030 And I’m just sort of interested in like how little we...do we need in a moving image to tell a story. 00:05:58.050 --> 00:06:11.030 ♪ 00:06:11.050 --> 00:06:18.030 Okay, so “Karo Ronnie’s Face” take one. Right. That’s how you guys do it? 00:06:18.050 --> 00:06:24.200 We got the Karo....I wonder how much is left? 00:06:24.220 --> 00:06:35.542 Yeah, there’s a little bit left. Just a little bit. I don’t want to mess with this paint job up on that too much.