Having a wonderful time, wish you could hear

I recommend "Sita Sings the Blues" to everyone who has ever loved mythology. It is beautiful, funny, clever, and touching. And check out this review about the problems Paley is facing just because her work is a beautiful mashup:

http://www.questioncopyright.org/nina_paley_sita_interview

"The scenario people always bring up... is like 'Well, what if a corporation exploited [laughs] your work without your permission.' It's like, well, you know, let's just balance that with corporations keeping me from making work in the first place!"

Wow. This is odder than a big bag of odd. And the Indian people talking is like watching a DVD with the Director's commentary switched on.

It's fascinating that even after reading all these words and looking at clips, I still have no real idea what to expect. But I like it when there are rules and reasons why things have been done in the way they have. Art needs rules. Stories need logic. Film needs more innovative ideas. As soon as it's available in the UK I'll be watching it. One day soon, right?

I'm sold. Maybe part 2 of the plan could be to make up some DVDs to sell? I'd buy one.

Not sure if I've EVER been the FIRST on here - and it may not appear that way if I'm OK'd after someone else - but I couldn't resist. I HAVE to see this film! It sounds positively ENCHANTING. It looks terrific from the stills, etc. I MUST SEE THIS! Thank you so much Roger for once again championing the little guys that are worth the - well, I was gonna say trouble, but it's not trouble if it's a worthy film so I'll say: "effort"... This looks GREAT! :)

I've been looking forward to seeing this movie since I first saw clips of it on Paley's site (you need to aimlessly surf the net more, Roger :). (Actually I found the link originally on a feminist blog.) I'm not surprised you loved it. The match of music and storyline/character is amazing, and very clever/brilliant/downright sneaky and cool.

The issue isn't the distributors. The issue is that the songs Annette Hanshaw sings (composed and recorded in the 1920s!) in the film are still restricted by copyright, and therefore no one is free to distribute a film that uses them, no matter how brilliant the film may be. So any distributor would need to pay tens of thousands of dollars just to "clear the rights". It's not surprising they're not lining up for the privilege.

I put "clear the rights" in quotes because it's such a disturbing concept: why should Nina Paley or anyone else have to get permission to make a derivative work? The history of art is a history of derivative works, but our current copyright system forces artists to avoid using each others' work -- to everyone's detriment. Nina Paley basically had to ignore that system for "Sita Sings The Blues" to exist. Now her film is in copyright jail, but at least she managed to make it.

Nina talks about the situation in detail here:

http://questioncopyright.org/nina_paley_sita_interview

Ebert: Eighty years later. Don't the copyright owners realize they are contributing to the destruction of their property by removing it from knowledge?

With any luck this film will find it's way here to Indianapolis soon, probably as a DVD. After viewing Tokyo Godfathers and Dante's Inferno on the Ovation network, I've discovered the uncharted frontiers of 2D animation and the bottomless creative energy in them, though I still wonder if there are any animation storytellers who have achieved greatness with an entire body of work on par with live-action directors like Fellini or Bergman. If there's anyone you can suggest, I'm all ears.

Merry Christmas to you and Chaz and all your family.

Ebert: Two words: Hayao Miyazaki. A world will open to you.

I"m intrigued by the take this woman has on the story of Rama and the Ramayan.

The story is actually, 98% of the time, told regarding the main part of the Ramayana story which is about Ram who is a an incarnation of God - of brahma, the spirit, of Christ, of Krishna, or who you will -- he is God, he embodies God.

His role on earth is to demonstrate dharam - duty, and how to live one's life. He is a good husband, he loves his wife, he is humble, he turns the other cheek against those who offend him, and wins hearts with love, humility, and peace. When his hand is forced, he fights for what is right.

This is the actual story of Ram the prince, and it is a very beloved tale by all Indians. There have been countless adaptions of it. It is very important to know this aspect of the story, though this animated tale seems to concentrate on a part of the tale that is actually not considered a large part of the Ramayana epic itself, and in fact is often considered a part of the epic that comes in a "sequel" if you will.

at any rate, the epic, as we recall, is about Ram (who embodies God), and later then suspects his wife of adultery. This is meant to be God himself, demonstrating the frailty of human beings, when they lack faith in the divine, when they disrespect the feminine aspect of God. In the epic, Ram himself knowingly, in consciousness, acts out this betrayal of the feminine, as a lesson to humanity, then is punished for it.

I thought these aspects of the tale are important to consider; the epic is not just about some evil husband who betrays his wife. The main Ramayana is not this story; but this tale of doubting his wife is toward the end of the epic, after many countless tales and lessons and acts of valour, heroism, and love by Ram for his wife Sita.

This woman, who has made this enchanted film, seems to have concentrated on the betrayal aspect (is she a feminist? is she bitter???? Her choice seems to betray an extreme vision of the epic, and does not take into account the metaphor and the knowledge by Indians that Ram was God-consciousness manifested on earth, AS WAS Sita, both to enact the frailties of human beings and the cost of disrespect to the feminine divine, in the final, last act of the Ramayana.)

I just see it as unfortunate that an animated fable such as this casts Ram as a villain, and suspect it has to do with the maker's own somewhat imbalanced view of the epic as a whole.

Vikas

To Russell, above, you would do well to take Ebert's advice. Start with "Spirited Away" and work your way backwards through Miyazaki's directorial efforts.

Disney, it ain't. I feel for those who brush off anything animated because of their preconceived beliefs about the medium. When advocates of animation talk about Miyazaki, we mean it.

Let http://www.nausicaa.net/index_old.shtml be your guide. It's helpful in case you are confused about some of the cultural stuff that doesn't quite get through the translation process. It isn't updated anymore, but this archive is indispensable.

Russel,
Aside from Miyazaki, you may want to check out Yuri Norstein.
His "Hedgehog in the Fog" is a work of genius.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRsXU4Q6a0Q

S

Merry Christmas, Roger Ebert!

http://www.eons.com/photos/group/callling-all-poets/photo/428370-Sextuple-Acrostic-For-Roger-Ebert-Profile-In-Courage?context=group

Ebert: That manages to be touching and amusing at the same time. And awfully ingenious! Thank you.

Yes, Hayao Miyazaki. I was thinking exactly the same thing. I am also reminded of "Triplets of Belville" and "Persepolis."
I guess I wouldn't make a good distributor, because these are the kinds of films I seek out. Although this may not be quite like any film I've seen before.

If Nina Paley celebrates Christmas, you must have just made hers. As for the rest of us, we're going to get awfully itchy waiting to see it.

Ebert: Miyazaki's "My Neighbor Totoro" is in my Great Movies collection. So also "Grave of the Fireflies," from Studio Ghibli.

Some of the animation style (at least as evident in the trailer) reminds me of Genndy Tartakovsky's "Samurai Jack," a similarly brilliant TV show on Cartoon Network I watched when I was younger. It was genius by Cartoon Network standards, and solid by anyone's standards; it's rare to see an American animated TV show so unique and preserving of artistic integrity.

As one of the privileged few who have seen the film, I find it terrible that it is held back by copyright restrictions in this manner. This is art, pure and simple, and deserves to be seen. What a wonderful film!

Um... wow. That was one trippy trailer.

All I can say is
A: The opening 31 seconds look like smoothly-done Monty Python animation, like Terry Gilliam got his hands on Flash.
B: This looks like the animation equivalent of "Across the Universe," a stylistic bazaar done as a musical.
C: I'm intrigued.

Mr. Ebert, thank you so much for bringing attention to Nina's work. It is simply criminal that this astounding and refreshingly original work of art is being prevented from reaching a wider audience because of a ridiculous loophole in arcane and overreaching copyright laws. The so-called rights holders (of which multiple claim 100% ownership??) have asked for the extortionist rate of $200,000 to clear the music for distribution, and they will not consider any other options, which is just patently ridiculous. There is no sense or logic to be had from the corporate masters, who prefer to kill the goose rather than get the golden eggs.

Wasn't the expiration on copyrights originally something like 15-20 years, without an option to renew? The idea was to allow the actual creative artists to profit from their own work during their lifetimes. It was when publishers, film companies and other corporate entities started buying out the creators' rights that the legal shenanigans started to extend the expiration date to half past forever. Now the rights to everything from novels to songs to computer code are owned by holding companies that have absolutely nothing to do with the original works. Them as can, do. Them as can't, buy it and litigate.

I agree with the previous poster Vikas when he expresses disappointment about how the whole epic is recast as a breakup tale. You get the sense that, through sheer novelty and ignorance, the movie is attracting viewers.

I imagine that if this was The Iliad or The Odyssey, people would be up in arms over how frivolous and gimmicky the whole thing is. I find it laughable that it's even considered in the same breath as Triplets of Belleville, let alone Miyazaki. It's rather insulting actually, not mention that it's s a shame that The Ramayana is gaining exposure through such a distorted lens.

Ebert: If you see it, you may get a more positive impression.

"An animated version of the epic Indian tale of Ramayana set to the 1920's jazz vocals of Annette Hanshaw."

That sentence was enough to make me want to see this film. After reading your essay and watching the clips, I NEED to see this movie.

Sita and booty...I did not think I would ever see those two words in the same sentence.

I can't wait to catch this animation and I am sure I am going to like it...I have had a lot of argument defending this take on the story of Ramayan.

Having known you for a long time (through your writings), I know where you are coming from. But I hope you realize what you are walking into when you wrote this.

Ebert: I am a complete innocent. However, the film is so sweet I hope it will not be seen as offensive. Certainly not as compared, for example, to "Monty Python's Life of Brian."

Roger, I'm a huge Hayao Miyazaki fan myself; there' simply no other person like him, he has this special eye for human detail that is unrivaled in animation. His movies almost play like great silent films.

My Neighbor Totoro and Princess Mononoke are among my favorites.

Have you ever seen Porco Rosso or Kiki's Delivery Service? I believe Kiki's Delivery Service might be the closest thing I've seen to being a truly flawless film. The animation, the direction the writing; its just wonderful.

Have you ever heard of an animated series called "Cowboy Bebop". Its one of the best tv shows I've ever seen, animated or not. Although most people don't want to waste 12.5 hours of their life or attention to find out. Note: Be sure to watch the English version if one ever gets a chance. And that goes for anyone.

I hear Keanu Reeves might star in a live action update. Can't say I'm looking forward to that. Nothing against Reeves personally.

I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and a very Happy New Year. God Bless. I've shortened my response today because I'm in a kind of melancholy mood at the moment. Catch ya next time.

Ebert: Agree with you on Kiki. Didn't see it when it came out, but I have now. He's one of those rare filmmakers where you can be sure you will admire any title.

I can't wait to see this. There needs to be more animated films like this with diffrent styles of animation, and not all Disney copies. But unfortunatly thats all the acadamy likes. Miyazaki, Persopolis, and Triplets deserved to win over the Disney stuff that won. Spirited Away did win. It's amazing how Disney started to take credit for Miyazaki's stuff.

Dear Mr. Ebert, I wonder if any chance you may watched some Chinese animate features,
China once produced some trully wonderful 2D animation in the early days, the great artists Wan brothers actually deeply influenced Osamu Tezuka - father of Japanese animation (Astro Boy). So sad that the tradition has gone with the wind and nowadays the screens in China are full of crappy Japanese copycat animation.

If possible, pls check out the masterpiece from 1964 called "Havoc in Heaven" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Havoc_in_Heaven, find this actually could be brought in US,http://www.cgcmall.com/Uproar_in_Heaven_DVD_p/dv00swk1.htm), the story is about the legendary monkey king (who has also been featured earlier this year in a rubbish hollywood movie) rebel against the mighty emperor. The animation and art design in this movie is fantastic and truly traditional, while the story suprisingly is full of Punk spirit (of course back then it's more read as communism revolution meaning). Also the score is gorgeous in chinese opera style (I'm actually not keen in chinese traditional music, and more in to western classical or rock music). Deep in heart, this is my favourite animation movie of all time, maybe only the movie "laputa" by master Miyazaki could come close.

Ebert: I haven't ever heard of it. Thank you.

And Russell, watch "Grave of the Fireflies" sometime ... sometime when you are prepared for what could be the most emotionally wrenching movie you ever see. It was for me. I'd like to watch it again, but I'm not sure I can. Roger has it in his Great Movies, because Roger is no dummy.

Agreed, some of the animation does look similar to Genndy Tartakovsky's work on Samurai Jack, which I still think is the best original show Cartoon Network has put on the air. Would love to see a feature length version of that work as well. Roger, maybe it's worth digging through your DVD backlog for some other unsung animated features as well and doing a whole chunk of your festival to them?

This review wasn't nearly positive enough.

"Sita Sings the Blues" is one of the most remarkable pieces of work in a very long time.

What an unexpected delight to see this movie be featured here.

I was walking in one of the multitudinous urban pockets in Seoul, South Korea several weeks ago and saw a brilliantly colored but small sign outside of a university for "A Modern Adaptation of the Ramayana." I had performed in a shadow puppetry adaptation of the Ramayana's sister story, the Mahabarata, a few years back, so out of filial loyalty I wandered into the lobby of the theater, paid the equivalent of three U.S. dollars and was shocked into a sudden fit of joy for the next hour and a half.

It's a pearl.

I discovered "Grave of the Fireflies" while I was a freshman in high school, and it was instantly one of my favorites. I'd rent movies from Blockbuster after school, particularly animation, and it kept staring at me between the Disney titles. I showed it to my little sister, who was in middle school, and she loved it, too. Though she spent 10 minutes in the bathroom afterward, recovering.

Through what age would you say it requires parental supervision?

I ask, because I have been conflicted about something I did a few years ago. It actually happened right after you put "Grave of Fireflies" on your Great Movies list. I was called in to substitute teach at a middle school in the morning, for a class of children with behavior problems, and the teacher's phone message stated that I could bring in my own lesson plan. It was no attempt of mine to be a lazy substitute, but rather an inspired notion that I could gather a bunch of "brats" together, and get them to read... a great movie.

I was there early, and so were a few of the children. They were thrilled to see a dvd player in the class, and I was thrilled, when the dvd player seemed nonfunctional, that the kids raced to the front and worked together to find the right plugs and fix the wiring, and set it up. They were proud of themselves for it.

A teacher's assistant walked in just as I was congratulating them, and the temperature turned icy. "There will be no movies today!" She told me to hand out worksheets. The children said spiteful things aloud to her, and she seemed used to it, and hardly flinched. But alas, the children wanted to see the film so badly, they finished the worksheets in record time.

I made no further mention of it, but the students were relentless in getting the assistant to give in and play it. She put it in, and left the room, not to return.

I told them that they would need to read the film, and that we could discuss it afterward. I explained a little bit about the war, and that was it.

The children were silent, involved, transfixed. They only spoke when they had a question- about the war, for example. Or when one of them didn't catch subtitles, and another would tell them what had been said. They gasped a few times, such as when missiles crashed into the village, and when the mother was shown in bloodied bandages.

At the end of the film, every single girl was crying. One of the boys said, "What, are you gonna cry" and as he said so, his voice cracked, and he made a huffing sound to keep his own tears from leaking out.

When it was over, a girl came up to me and said "Could I call my mother?" "What for?" "To tell her I love her."

The students asked for the name of the movie. They wrote it down. They asked where they could buy it on dvd. They wrote it down. They loved "Grave of the Fireflies," just as I had at that age.
They were unbelievably kind toward each other throughout the day.
But had I commited a thoughtless, stupid error?

When their teacher found out what I had done, she went straight to the principal, and banned me from her classroom.

Ebert: A story very inspiring. If you had replaced that teacher, the lives of those kids might have been changed much for the better.

I love the Ramayana! Every summer for 15 years, my mom, little sister and I would drive from wherever we were living to an ashram in upstate New York. I grew up on Hindu folklore, and had read the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, in addition to the Odyssey and Aesop's fables by the time I was ten. But, I've never seen it from Sita's point of view, and that is where this excites me.

I can tell the story from memory, from Dasharath giving his wives holy rice pudding, up to the point that Rama returns victorious after fourteen years of exile, but how he treated Sita after her time with Ravana in Lanka is usually glossed over nowadays, as it's extreme by any standards. He acknowledges that she stayed faithful, but still can't be with her because she spent twelve years in the company of a man who wasn't her husband! Of course, since Rama was a reincarnation of Vishnu, and Sita was a reincarnation of Durga, there was a whole karmic bent to the story that is missed completely.

I'm not trying to justify the cruelty, by any means. Nina's husband was a cold bastard for ending their relationship the way he did, but what came from it? Art, which never would have appeared in quite the same way as it does now. I, for one, am going to start hounding my local movie theatre as soon as the royalty and distribution difficulties are dealt with.

On a slightly lighter vein, that of receiving what you give, I gave my brother-in-law Studs Terkel's memoir "Touch and Go," and, from my big sister, I received his "My American Century." Of course, there's a little envy there, as my big sister also gave him a Studs book, so he's got two to my one. Ah, well.

Happy Boxing Day, Roger.

Every title mentioned is now written in my mini-notebook with a box beside each reserved for upcoming check marks. Thanks so much for the input.
P.S. Roger, I hate to be a stickler, but it's Monty Python's Life of Brian.

This is sad. You do this just to torture the vast majority of your readers who will never have a chance to see this film. Right?

Originality is so rare nowadays, and this film looks as if it's truly unique (in the true sense of the word). Someday, perhaps. Keep us posted!

Alright, I maybe naive but it appears to me that the copyright holders to the Annette Hanshaw songs are being very shortsighted. Here they have a wonderful way of bringing these old songs from the twenties to a new audience that have never heard them before. The soundtrack album from “Sita sings the Blues” would probably generate a lot of revenue alone.

=v= Actually, you should get a look at Nina's high school class projects. Not as amazing as Sita, but stunning in their own right!

"I imagine that if this was The Iliad or The Odyssey, people would be up in arms over how frivolous and gimmicky the whole thing is."

I don't think either of those are beloved enough to cause outrage. O Brother Whre Art Thou was an exceedingly gimmicky and frivolous treatment of The Odyssey, and hardly anybody even noticed, let alone objected. Western works get adapted out of recognition all the time (like when Beowulf was turned into The 13th Warrior) and nobody gets angry about it.

I first read about Sita Sings the Blues in a Wired article earlier this year when the film was scheduled for the Tribeca fest. I'm a big fan of animation in general, and I was immediately taken by the character design, and the idea of animating the Ramayana.

Living in Bangkok, where Thais have their own version of the Ramayana (the Ramakien), I immediately thought the film would have resonance with the Thais and wondered if it would be shown at one of the city's film festivals. Well, lo and behold, the World Film Festival of Bangkok snapped up the film and made my wish come true. Seeing it with an audience was a great experience. I was so happy

Roger, I hope you are able to screen Sita at your film fest. It is indeed a real treat, and a trip.

I bought "My Neighbor Totoro" as a Christmas present for my girlfriend. Now I know what to get her for her birthday. It's weird, I spent most of my life watching what could best be described as "guy" films, and now as I hit middle age I often find myself delighted by these gentle and sweet natured movies. This hasn't been touched upon yet, but people interested in the other films mentionned in the comments should also check out "Waking Life". It's a film of such utter beauty and intelligence and spirit that if I was on my deathbed and someone asked if I'd like for them to play anything while I died, I'd ask for "Waking Life". And this isn't like some lame desert island list, I really mean it. It's just that kind of a film. Also, not animated but still wonderful, the Japanese film "Ping Pong". Whenever someone with kids asks me what film they should get, I always include "Ping Pong". Hell, I've even bought it as baby shower presents for friends.

Changing gears, it's a shame about the Copyright laws. They used to be about the protection of the artist and his immediate family, now they're about protection of the work itself for the profit of megacorporations who know damn well that their iconic characters should be in the public domain by now. Personally, I believe the law should be repealed to the Copyright act of 1976 (AKA: 75 years, or the life of author plus 50 years.) Unless you're Highlander, that's ALL you need. The Sonny Bono act of 1998 extended this to 95/120 years, or life plus 70 years. For who? Methuselah? To me this is not law but lunacy. No one will ever live that long, and no one's relatives deserve that much control over their work.

I'll go one further and say that I have a suspicion that all these remakes and reimagingings are the result of copyright laws gone awry. (Notice that the trend started in 1998) Since you can't come up with anything original anymore without risking a court battle, it's easier and cheaper to simply buy the rights of an older work and update it.

Bah... all this legal mumbo jumbo is irrelevant. Nina Paley, you created something that brought people joy and for that you should be proud. In the end that's all that matters.

To vikas's comment, and those of others who fear that this film doesn't respect the epic: I'm an Indian and I love this movie. If you watch the trailer you'll see that throughout the entire thing you'll hear Indians commenting on characters, motives, and the versions of the story they heard growing up. A list of collaborators, including many Indians.

http://www.sitasingstheblues.com/collaborators.html

It's an epic, a classic. No one gets to say "This is the One True Ramayana and any retelling that focuses on a part I don't care for is Wrong." And that goes for Beowulf, the Iliad, and all those spinoffs of Austen and Eyre.

If you watch the film, you'll see that it is indeed a tale of love, romance, exile, reunion, and then the episode you consider an optional sequel at the end. But if the Ramayana is a tale of hard ethical choices, then the ugly episode fits right in. Dasharatha must choose between his promise to his heir and his promise to his wife. Sita chooses between chastity and giving in to her kidnapper's demands. And Rama chooses between his credibility as a king and his loyalty to his faithful wife.

Those interested in the many versions and interpretations of this ancient epic can read more in the work of Madhu Kishwar and Paula Richman. A relevant essay by Kishwar is here:

http://www.ninapaley.com/Sitayana/Manushi_LadySingstheBlues.html

An in-depth discussion of how many versions of the Ramayana treat the incident of Sita's "test" and abandonment is here:

http://www.sepiamutiny.com/sepia/archives/002046.html

Ebert: I must say I felt no disrespect in "Sita," only affection and a sharing of Sita's plight.

AAARRRRGH!!!!!
Not another one of those great movies that I start suffering about from the moment I read of them because I know they will never show in my town in Mexico or the town in the US across the border from mine... At least with pictures like The Grave of the Fireflies, I can get them through netflix (thanks to you, by the way, Roger); but what do I do about this one? Much as I would love to finally go to Urbana in 2009, I doubt if this will be the year I finally make it to your festival...
Anyway, Sita Sings the Blues is on my list now.
Oh, Merry Christmas!

As an Indian-born American (we moved in 1976 when I was not yet two), I have to see this. Your description is all the more enticing.

I'm tangentially reminded of Peter Brook's adaptation of the "Mahabharata" for BBC. It was also done in a style... indirectly adapted from the original by way of the stage play. And so the relationship between player and audience is changed by the use of mechanisms like asides, the overt entrances and exits of characters, and the emphatic monologues, etc. performed all the same for the miniseries.

Here, it seems as if they've done a bit of Mystery Science Theater. But the endearing quality of that isn't entirely western. There's a long history in India of philosophical discourse that many Indians have carried over with them to the west. Many of my childhood days were spent listening to my family and their colleagues, friends, and relatives deeply engaged in coffee-table debate over everything from pinochle to politics, over a cup of chai.

Indian philosophy and religion is often like that... discussed with less overbearing reverence and more colloquial humor. One can't be too serious when discussing the underlying meaning of some parable involving four-armed gods or couples joined in cosmic copulation for 10,000 years. What if one of them has to go to the bathroom? For how long? Is that what monsoons are?

These days, few people have time to get into it for hours, much less minutes. Hearing it, accompanied with these magnificent, vibrant, funny and charming images (Sita "borrowing" Shiva's ring of fire had me chuckling heartily), feels familiar like being reunited with a favorite blanket from my childhood.

Ebert: On a panel at the Calcutta Film Festival, it was a real treat to hear pure theory debated. The book stalls outside the theater were selling Bazin and Godard, not Star Trek.

Not yet another ending to the Ramayana epic. Well altering the ending to the Ramayana is an Indian tradition, and a version that considers Sita (the face that launched a thousand monkeys) as a character and human being sounds good to me. I look forward to seeing it and I hope it finds a distributor.

Roger, I am delighted that you liked my review and honored that you saw fit to link to it here on your blog. Since you're my role model as a film critic and journalist, it is a thrill for me to have you recognize my work.

I think there must be a distributor out there who would be willing to shell out the money for the music rights. This movie is a winner that would, I believe, pay back the investment.

Ebert: Not just your review, but your homework and all the time it took to find and insert that art. You put a lot of love into your blog.

"Sita Sings the Blues", as far as I can tell, was made with an application called Flash, originally created to allow detailed animation for Internet websites. It has since evolved into a standard of sorts for the modern animator. The norm in film and TV animation seems to have shifted to either 3D or Flash for the potential and cost-effectiveness of both.

I like Flash animation. However, all the attention Hayao Miyazaki has gotten in this post has made me realize I really miss hand-drawn 2D animated films.

Even if a Flash designer avoids a Wacom tablet and draws their frames on paper -or transparent sheets, and bless you if you still do- when the art is scanned and worked in the application, the animation becomes too fluid if you ask me. It's a bit hard to explain but if you've seen shows like "Pucca" and "Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends" then you probably know what I mean.

Consider, on the other hand, the hog demon surrounded by worms in "Princess Mononoke", the expanding body of Tetsuo in "Akira" or countless other impossible sights from films like "Paprika" or "Spirited Away". All were done the old fashioned 2D way. We don't even need to concentrate solely on Japan; the Mountain King from "Fantasia" is still impressive so many decades later.

Maya, Flash, Renderman, 3ds Max, pen and ink... In the end, they're all just tools, nothing more than an author's chosen canvas. If you have a good story, your chosen method will only enhance it and we, your audience, will be the ones benefitted.

Still, wasn't it rather nice to sit in a theater during the beginning of "Enchanted" and watching vintage Disney animation for a moment, even if it was in self-parody?

And since I mention "Enchanted"... Am I the only one who thinks Amy Adams' facial features resemble Greta Garbo's?

Ebert: Good gravy! She does! Junebug!

Confound it all.

'Sita Gets The Blues' played at the Vancouver International Film Festival this year. This one will be going on my most regretted misses from the the VIFF along with Lance Hammer's 'Ballast' and Bela Tarr's 'The Man from London'.

DVD releases of these can't come soon enough.

This looks fresh and invigorating and interesting. I wish we could see it. Being pragmatic (and realizing that waiting for the Sonny Bono Act to be changed will take my lifetime), do you think that a publicity campaign can be done to get this film picked up by a major player (who would pay the copyright?). I am quite ignorant of how movies get to theaters, so forgive my stupidity. Can a studio buy an indie film and then distribute it (I think so, no?). Would they? (that's the rub, right there...). I am interested in Indian culture and this seems to be a quirky combination of Hollywood, Bollywood and animation. I'd like my kids to see it. There's money to be made here--too bad for the shortsightedness of some.

That's a shame. I hope this finds a path to an audience. I don't think that I can recall another animated picture made by a woman.

Speaking of animation, are you going to review Delgo? I didn't even know it's existed until I saw the cascade of headlines. I don't want to see it. I just want to know how bad it could possibly be.

Nina is an extraorinary talent! Thank you so much, Roger, for giving her marvelous film such great attention! It's a shame the copyright laws are what they are. I would have loved to have seen get a distribution deal for this film so it at least could have been eligible for consideration by the Academy.

Roger,

There's been a lot of mention of Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli on this blog. It's true that Miyazaki is a genius of animation. His fantasy movies -- such as "Spirited Away," "My Neighbor Totoro," "Princess Mononoke," and "Kiki's Delivery Service" -- are certainly proof of that. And "Grave of the Fireflies," directed by Isao Takahata, is certainly one of the most powerful and heartbreaking films I've ever seen, animated or otherwise.

One Studio Ghibli film that gets overlooked (and which I hope you can review some day, Roger) is "Whisper of the Heart," directed by the late Yoshifumi Kondo, with a screenplay by Miyazaki. "Whisper" tells the engaging story of a young girl, Shizuku Tsukushima, who makes some crucial decisions about what she will do with her life.

I think "Whisper" is one of the best examples of the genius of Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. Why? Because most of the story takes place in the Real World of modern-day Tokyo, not in an "Animated Fantasy" world. The characters in the film are Real World characters who just happen to be animated. Shizuku, the heroine of the story, is a very realistic teenage girl, with Real World worries about school, boys, her parents, etc.

Watching "Whisper," you have the sense that the story would have been a great movie if it had been done in live action. But Miyazaki & Co. did the story in animation. THAT is the proof of their genius. They prove that animation does not have to be limited as a medium for telling fantasy stories; it can be used to tell Real World stories with realistic characters as well.

"Whisper of the Heart" is available on DVD in the U.S. from Disney video. Below is a link to the trailer on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5WL5Pzi7Wo

P.S. I sincerely hope that "Sita Sings The Blues" finds a distributor soon. I'd love to see the whole film on a theater screen.

Ebert: I am a complete innocent.

If innocence is ignorance. Paley too. People get carried away by things. The referenced work is a hallowed scripture, not a fairy tale or a sentimental fiction. Artists need to be wise and responsible. Its a fragile world.

Ebert: It is. And I know it is very fragile in India and Pakistan today.

So that's what became of Nina Paley. I remember reading her comic strips when I lived in Santa Cruz--they were very painfully true-to-life and funny about the Santa Cruz "experience". The movie looks really cool...

Hey Nina! If you're reading this, someone from Santa Cruz remembers your old strip!

BTW, another thought. Last year we watched many of the Hayao Miyazaki movies again when we had our granddaughter up to visit. What surprised me is that I didn't care as much for Kiki (which I had loved) and Totoro (again, loved) and Spirited Away (do I have to say it?) the second time around as I did The Cat Returns and Howl's Moving Castle. In fact we watched both several times in as many days and I liked them each time. The Cat Returns I'd thought was fun but too lightweight the first around but I really loved it. We still bring smiles to each others faces by saying "But I don't want to marry a cat!" or "Oh. Miss Haruuuuu!" We also saw Whisper of the Heart without realising it was where the Baron first appeared, in quite a different, realistic context. And you could tell the fat cat was Moon right away because of the way he walked.

And as Jennifer said (but I'd forgotten) I too used to read and love Nina Paley's comic back when I lived in Santa Cruz.

I am lucky enough to have seen Sita and it is magical. Thank you for spreading the word.

The Ramayana is about love, duty and honor. Just as Christ gave himself for his people, so did Rama and Sita sacrifice for us ... the duty and dharma ... not a tale of a "spineless husband" which I find offensive in this revisionist re-telling.

I hope that "innocence" is not being used to justify "ignorance."

From Wiki...

Rama and Sita are the protagonists in one of the most famous love stories of all time. Described as being deeply in love, Sita and Rama are theologically understood as avatars of Lakshmi and Vishnu respectively. When Rama is banished from the kingdom, he attempts to convince Sita not to join him in a potentially dangerous and certainly arduous existence in the jungle, but Sita rejects this. When Rama orders her in his capacity as husband, Sita rejects it, asserting that it was an essential duty of a wife to be at her husband's side come good or ill.[20] Rama in turn is assiduously protective and caring for Sita throughout the exile.

When Sita is kidnapped by Ravana, both Sita and Rama undergo great personal hardships during their separation. Sita protects her chastity assiduously, and survives over a year in captivity on the strength of her love and attention to religious values and duty. She is completely unfettered in her resolve despite Ravana's courting, cajoling and threats. Meanwhile Rama, not knowing who had kidnapped Sita or where was she taken, often succumbs to despair and tears, denouncing himself for failing to defend her and agonizing over her safety and pain. Sita knows that it is in Rama's destiny to fight to rescue her (she refuses to be rescued thus by Hanuman, who discovers her), but is deeply anxious for his safety and fearful of Ravana's power.

Agni pariksha
After Rama slays Ravana and wins the war, Sita wants to come before him in the state which over a year's imprisonment had reduced her to, Rama arranges for Sita to be bathed and given beautiful garments before they are re-united. But even as Sita comes before him in great excitement and happiness, Rama does not look at her, staring fixedly at the ground. He tells her that he had fought the war only to avenge the dishonour that Ravana had inflicted on Rama, and now Sita was free to go where she pleased. At this sudden turn of events, all the vanaras, rakshasas, Sugriva, Hanuman and Lakshmana are deeply shocked.

Sita begs Lakshmana to build her a pyre upon which she could end her life, as she could not live without Rama. At this point, Lakshmana is angered at Rama for the first time in his life, but following Rama's nod, he builds a pyre for Sita. At the great shock and sorrow of the watchers, Sita walks into the flames. But to their greater shock and wonder, she is completely unharmed. Instead, she glows radiantly from the centre of the pyre. Immediately Rama runs to Sita and embraces her. He had never doubted her purity for a second, but, as he explains to a dazzled Sita, the people of the world would not have accepted or honoured her as a queen or a woman if she had not passed this Agni pariksha before the eyes of millions, where Agni would destroy the impure and sinful, but not touch the pure and innocent.

Another version of this, used in Ramanand Sagar's RAMAYAN, was that Rama had known Sita was going to be abducted by Ravana ahead of time. So, he entrusted her to Agni Dev, or the God of Fire. Rama did this so that he, who in reality was Vishnu, could kill Ravana. Sita, in turn, left behind a "shadow", or twin-like version of herself behind. The "shadow" Sita had been abducted by Ravana. Therefore, the lila of Agni Pariksha was to retrieve the genuine Sita from the temporary care of Agni Dev. Rama explains this to Lakshmana before the so-called "Pariksha" is done. This version has also been written in the Ram Charit Manas.

Sita's banishment
In the Uttara Kanda, Rama banishes his wife Sita, even as she is pregnant, asking Lakshmana to deliver her safely to Rishi Valmiki's ashram. He does so when it is reported to him that some subjects of his in Ayodhya believe that Sita is unchaste due to her long captivity in Ravana's city. The Agni pariksha fails to convince these few critics, but Rama, by his understanding of the dharma of a king, decides to banish Sita. Rama adhered strictly to his duty both as a king and a husband. These conflicted when society thought that Sita was unfit to become queen. But Rama had to send away Sita since his duty of king came first.

Ebert: I hasten to say Nina Paley did not describe Rama as "spineless." That was only me.

I would love to see this film! I wonder if Nina would consider entering it in our local animation festival?

http://redstickfestival.org/

My kids and I are HUGE fans of Hayao Miyazaki. We've seen many, many of his films!

Hey... It's me again... ;)

Shame on me for not looking at the official website for the movie before my previous comment. Sita's blues is scheduled to be at the Red Stick Animation festival in '09!

WOO HOO!

I'm confused about this whole 'freeing the rights' deal-- I thought that all that had to happen to use a song was to pay a set fee. Lots of people make movies and use the work of other popular, copyrighted artists all the time and clearly have no trouble paying for the rights to the music-- if all it takes is tens of thousands of dollars, that's still pitifully low compared to the budget of most major studio animations these days.

Roger, I am so excited you discovered Nina and her "Sita." I saw a screening last November and just went nuts, like you did. It must mean the world to her to have you be so delighted with her work.

Ebert: Hi, Susie! You still have that terrific blog. Readers, click on Susie's name above (may be NSFW).

Odd to encounter Hanuman here. He has been in my thoughts very recently as I trace my past by moving my belongings from one house to another. There is the Balinese mask of Hanuman that I bought at around 12-13 in Indonesia, the Monkey-Magic television show which holds great nostalgia value, and memories of reading Wu Cheng En's "Journey to the West" in High school.

In that version Hanuman jumps through the waterfall and becomes the Monkey King. I feel like I've been jumping through a waterfall or two lately. Difficult to imagine Hanumanji tied down to copyright law; he's more likely to get entangled in it, cause mischief, and come out unscathed. Where is the adventure to life gone?

One man's hallowed scripture is another's sentimal fiction or fairy tale. For a land and especially a religious culture well-known for tolerance (Hinduism folded the often embarrassing Tantric stuff into its faith with nary a hiccup, after all), I'm surprised by some of the responses. One of the charms of Hindus and Indians generally is how little they resemble Muslims, Christians and Jews. Don't change now, please. The filmmaker meant no disrespect.

Nina's film is funny and treats the whole thing with a much needed lightness of touch - I just watched "Les Demoiselles de Rochefort" -one of Jacques Demi's trio of bizarre, but highly enjoyable musicals, which has a similar lightness of touch but has a basically banal storyline (as does "Umbrellas of Cherbourg") centred on relationships.

One of the things lost in a lot of Ramayana adaptations (deliberately in order to underline the characters divinity) is this lightness - these are people we can barely identify with and the scale is always "EPIC" - but Demi manages to turn the banal into something epic, Nina has turned the epic into something banal,& what they have in common is accessibility.

The other common factor is the independant spirit - Demi's films never spawned a culture of musical films in France and are considered unique in French cinema - I wouldn't even class him with the other New Wave film makers of his generation.

Hi Roger,

If you're in the mood for brilliant but little-known indie animation (and who isn't?), I very strongly recommmed the work of Don Hertzfeldt. He's a Sundance regular and Oscar nominee, but like so many of these American artists is a self-distributor and do-it-yourselfer. Yet he's easily made some of the funniest, most groundbreaking, and with his latest work some of the most poignant films I've ever seen. Seriously. For whatever it's worth, my very strongest endorsement! :)

"[The Ramayana] tells the story of a brave, noble woman who was made to suffer because of the perfidy of a spineless husband and his mother."

I suppose that is accurate in a narrow, literal sense, but it is about as misleading as saying to someone who has never heard of the Bible, "The Bible tells the story of a woman who is seen bathing by a king, and then the king causes her husband to be killed in battle and marries her."

Seriously, Rama's eventual treatment of Sita is a very minor -- though extremely troubling -- part of the narrative, coming at the very end, after the main action is over, and possibly added by later writers. This isn't the first film to focus on that part of the story in order to send a feminist message (c.f. Deepa Mehta's "Fire"), and there's nothing wrong with doing so -- but perhaps you should make it clear that this is a feminist re-telling of the story which chooses to emphasize a small portion of it for thematic reasons, rather than portraying that minor segment as if it were the entire point of the Ramayana. (In the main part of the Ramayana, Rama and Sita are an idealized and devoted couple, and he travels the length of India in order to save her.)

Also, the villain in the Ramayana has 10 heads, and has always had them. I'm not sure quite sure where the idea that he is a "lustful king who occasionally grows 12 heads" comes from.

Ebert: From misinformed me. I got carried away. Fixed now.

Tea, these songs would have already been in the public domain and free to use if Congress had not unfairly extended copyright several times over the 20th century at the behest of Disney. As Paley puts it, "They were supposed to be in the public domain in the 1980's, but [then Congress extended copyright]... because we need this incentive to get more people to write songs in 1927!"

Not to mention that there is no such thing as compulsory licensing for copyright in the US. There is no industrywide set fee where as long as an artist pays the fee then the rightsholder has to let them use the song/poem/whatever. The holder can charge as much as they want. So this keeps a lot of art from being made.

It would cost $220,000 to clear the music rights for "Sita Sings the Blues." This is not a major studio animation; this is an indie picture. Think "Tarnation." According to iMDB, "Tarnation" "cost $218 to make but the budget rose to $400,000, once music and video clip royalties were included." This scared distributors off for "Tarnation" and it's scaring distributors off for "Sita."

Check out the Paley interview at questioncopyright for more details.

thanks to Vip for his comments.

I am not saying this film does not have its attractive qualities. But it's certainly a film that does not take the time to really understand the Ramayan - treats it flippantly, unfortunately, which is why i wondered where the maker was coming from and if her own bitterness clouded the tale.

The Ramayan is a veyr sacred text with extraordinary layers, and to see it reduced thus is a bit upsetting, and also a bit disturbing to see the ignorance with respect to it.

Hindus tend to be very laid back about these things...gentle people in general. If this was a sacred text of Islam about which such a film had been made, there would be such an extraordinary backlash.

The freedom to make such a piece is sacred in itself. I just find the ignorance in the west about the story disturbing, and also disturbing to realize that it is this tale, old with a bitter bent about Rama and Sita, which will be the introductio to the ramayan for a lot of people.
Vikas

I don't see where you get "bitter" from this... if anything, it seems utterly joyous. Maybe a little flippant, sure, but I don't think this is any sort of cultural appropriation as much as cultural appreciation.

These things go on all the time, and not just for "feminist" purposes. i mean, how many people know the Odyssey only through Ulysses by James Joyce, or (to use a non-mythological story) Romeo and Juliet via West Side Story?

The copyright thing bothers me, if for one reason which is that it seems short-sighted. I had never heard of Annette Hanshaw before this, and I would gladly buy a collection of her songs because of this movie.

Ebert: Me, too. But Hanshaw's estate is not the copyright holder. The songs themselves are in copyright, and they are not copyrights that were ever owned by the composers, but by music publishing companies, now swallowed by mindless and inattentive corporations, who care only about the revenue, not the use. We owe this state of affairs primarily because Disney was terrified that Mickey and Donald would slip into public domain.

SOlomon Wakeling: Ironically, my first encounter with Hanuman was also from a very strange source - Dungeons and Dragons. One version had a race called the "Vanara," who were agile monkey people know for their playfulness and spirituality. A little digging showed me it came directly from the myths of Hanuman.

I understand what you mean about mindless corporations, but even then, I think that even a minimally-distributed movie would increase recognition, and therefore sales, of Hanshaw's music. O Brother Where Art Thou lived on as a soundtrack long after the movie. As a fan of that era of music, I'm glad to have discovered Hanshaw. However, I'd rather hear her through SIta's mouth.

Considering Paley's copyright woes, I'm reminded of surrealist Joseph Cornell, who made collages out of everything--including films. He'd buy old stock footage, industrial/instructional films, etc. and edit-and-loop it all into works that were alternately amusing, puzzling, dreamlike, and disturbing. (You can see a few of them on the 7-disc collection, Unseen Cinema--talk about your fitting titles.)

He started making films in the 1930s, and according to Andy Ditzler's website Film Love, "until late in his life Cornell was extremely reluctant to show his films publicly, possibly as the result of a contretemps at his first ever public screening. In 1936 he showed his film Rose Hobart at Julien Levy’s New York gallery, and a jealous Salvador Dali, in town for the Museum of Modern Art’s epic exhibition on Surrealism, overturned the projector and verbally attacked Cornell. ('My idea for a film is exactly that,' he said shortly afterward. 'I never wrote it down or told anyone, but it is as if he had stolen it.') So upset was Cornell by the incident that it would be the early 1960s before Jonas Mekas would persuade him to once again screen his work for the filmgoing public. No wonder he could lament, as he did in 1968, that 'my films never really got off the ground.'"

It seems intellectual property lawyers aren't the only villains in the art world. I just hope Paley isn't as shy as Cornell.

Ebert: Dali's reasoning is...surrealist.

You may not be aware of this, but I see in some of the art the influence of Richard Adams' legend'ry unfinished film The Thief and the Cobbler, which also influenced Disney's Aladdin (and of course The Thief of Baghdad influenced all three, I'm sure.) The trailer may entice you, but I understand if you have to file it away until they make a 70-minute hour.

Another must-read laud for Sita is here.

http://www.thehousenextdooronline.com/2008/05/siff-34-dispatch-two.html

Quote: "The director’s settings of 1929 jazz and blues 78s as counterpoint to the 14th-century saga of the goddess Sita and her Lord Rama may be the most emotionally evocative use of American popular song on a movie screen since Herbert Ross’s 1981 version of Dennis Potter’s Pennies from Heaven."

Ebert: That is a particularly good blog.

All the praise Miyazaki gets is deserved. However my favorite Miyazaki film is his first, "Castle of Cagliostro", which does not receive enough attention. Insofar as it is a movie about a character who is the anime equivalent of James Bond, it’s understandable. One may wonder how a great auteur could shine working within the framework of an established franchise, but the answer in Miyazaki’s case is: very well. It’s such a hugely entertaining movie with no shortage of the kind of creativity that he would exhibit in his later work.

That said, the cultish worship of Miyazaki by Westerners sometimes overshadows the work of other anime directors. First and foremost there is Satoshi Kon, who’s "Tokyo Godfathers" and "Paprika" have already been mentioned. But it’s his "Millennium Actress" that is really outstanding and as good as anything Miyazaki has ever done. Another tragically unappreciated film is Gisaburo Sugii’s adaptation of the Japanese children’s classic "Night on the Galactic Railroad." I’d also recommend "Memories", "Neo-Tokyo" and "Robot Carnival", all of which are anthologies of short films by great anime directors.

It's always a good idea to watch what someone like Miyazaki recommends: Yuriy Norshteyn, or what Aardman does. Brad Bird's work is always seminal, as is Pixar's in general. All of which makes me very angry at the Academy for being too afraid to give animated films a shot at Best Picture (do they get shot at Best Director?). Spirited Away, you win my heart over A Beautiful Mind any day.

(Although, I always did wonder at the applause Beauty and the Beast always got, and at its Best Picture nomination. It feels like it's pro-bestiality at times, no?).

Tangentially

"In his most well-known work, Doctor Zhivago, the Russian poet Boris Pasternak denounces the apostles of this kind of radical ideology saying that they "have never understood a thing about life ... have never felt its breath, its heartbeat." (Boris Pasternak, Doctor Zhivago New York: Signat Books, 1960, p. 282.) .

Saumyendranath Tagore, nephew of the poet, was apparently a tragic example of this malady. Although originally an adherent of Gandhism, he later became a communist and came to criticize virulently, and work against, Gandhi. In his diaries, Romain Rolland describes the young man who had visited him thus: "He is without doubt a generous idealist, very sincere and ready to sacrifice everything for his faith. Which makes it all the more sad to see these fine forces, intelligent and pure, hurling themselves against the greatest and purest of Indians. The fatal madness afflicting the souls of individuals swept up in the whirlwind of revolutions! " (Romain Rolland and Gandhi Correspondence New Delhi: Publications Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India, 1976, p. 295.)."

Daisaku Ikeda, "Toward a World without War: Gandhism and the Modern World" (National Museum Delhi, New Delhi, 1992)

Mr. Ebert, could you kindly clarify a technical detail? To quote you: "Sita lived around 200 BC, a date which inspires lively debate among the three Indians discussing her. "

Does the "lively debate" you refer to go over this detail? I want it to be clear that Sita and Rama, if living persons, could not have been Indian contemporaries of the Romans.

I was taught that the Mahabharata(Lord Krishna) took place 3,000-5,000 years BC. The Ramayana is set in prehistoric times much earlier than the Mahabharata. 200 BC would place Lord Rama chronologically AFTER Lord Krishna, which is just plain wrong.

It so happens that I am listening to Krishna Das' CD "Flow of Grace" as I read your blog about this DVD. I love it - please check it out. It is a hearty, musically and lyrically enjoyable, guileless, and sincere Western interpretation of the Hanuman Chalisa, a chant in praise of Lord Hanuman (a.k.a. the Monkey God), an incarnation of Shiva.

Ebert: My confusion. Wikipedia says the Ramayana "is an ancient Sanskrit epic thought to have been compiled between approximately 400 BCE and 200 CE." When the events took place is of course another matter altogether.

Great review and thanks for delving into the absurdity of the copyright-holders arguments and their effect on art: I only now realize how lucky I am to have seen the film at an SF screening last year.

So here is my plan. Beginning in Chicago, I will enlist a cadre of starving art teachers, vengeful wives and resourceful Indian-Americans to work with the mailing lists of Facets, the Music Box, the Landmark and the Gene Siskel Film Center. They will break into the houses of those film lovers, throw mails bag over their heads, chain them to seats in a movie theater, and allow them to watch "Sita Sings the Blues." If they don't love it, let 'em sue me.

Sign me up!

I haven't seen this yet...but I see the pictures of the main character.

Is it wrong to hope she has a nude scene?

Ebert: Yes, that would be wrong.

Dave: if it were not for video games I would not know what I Lycanthrope is. They can be great for general knowledge and the imagination. Many of the early games are inspired by Homer.

The above, I suspect, would make a fine video game, perhaps not unlike Mickey's own castle of illusions. The adult soundtrack would only add to its charm, the way it does in Shrek and in Lilo & Stitch. Myths are old enough that they belong to the common human heritage. Disney is welcome to their little mouse; who wants it? Classical myth is much more gory and so more fun.

I'm surprised no one (so far) has mentioned Nina's earlier short film, FETCH!

See it here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hbla1JXVwaU

I saw this a few years ago and thought it was delightful as well as brilliant. Looking at the clip from 'sita' it is also an interesting precursor to that film, showing the artist's interest in yoga towards the end. I'm very happy to see that she is still creating art and looking forward to buying a copy of the dvd.

Hopefully with the popular acclaim this film and Miyazaki's forthcoming "Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea" gets some Hollywood studio heads may take notice and give Ms. Paley a staff and a budget to do some large commercial features (are you listening, Jeffrey Katzenberg?).

I saw half of "Triplets of Belville", and decided to record the second half and watch it tomorrow. I really liked how there was just about no dialogue in the movie--I really liked that. If there was one thing I would change in the movie it would be to have long unbroken takes from time to time (I guess the many cuts in the film were to counterbalance the lack of dialogue...--but still). And after reading your review about torture and things like that in the movie, I'm really excited to see it.

But this movie ("Sita Sings the Blues") looks really splendid in its animation. And I'm really looking forward to the overlapping you mentioned.

To Russel:

Ovation network is where I saw "Triplets of Belville" but didn't want to see "Tokyo Godfathers"....but I may take a look, if just to see more of this 2-d animation, as well as "Persepolis".

"Spirited Away" is indeed pretty awesome, in its visual unpredictability as part of the story.

Miyazaki was an executive producer for a film with raccoons with giant testicles called "Pom Poko". http://www.xopl.com/blog/embedded/pompokoballs1.jpg
http://www.xopl.com/blog/embedded/pompokoballs2.jpg

Sorry, I love Miyazaki--and his "My Neighbor Totoro", as well-- (love that cat in the movie), but I just remember laughing a lot with my friend while watching it in disbelief.

Okay, I have not seen "Grave of the Fireflies"....that and "Persepolis" are on my list of rentals. I wish I could say the same about "Sita Sings the Blues" one day. I'll just take comfort in the odd imaginings that if it were out, I'd probably not be able to rent it because someone decided to not return it to the video store.

Did your hear what I said, distributors?--It will be so good, people will steal it from the video store....you still get to make people mad and make the bank, as opposed to making them mad without it.

As in agriculture, medicine, newspapers, the military, and even our very government itself, and many other facets of modern American life that big corporations have stolen from us, the ridiculous "in perpetuity" copyright laws strip away creativity, freshness and everything good and honorable. They let those corporations churn yet one more commodity mercilessly until it turns into money, which is all they feed on and all they see.

Satoshi Kon's Millennium Actress and Tokyo Godfathers were quite good. Paprika underwhelmed me. I felt that he was playing reality-bending games without really earning them this time. Did not really add much to his oeuvre. But it's Perfect Blue that I love. That was his masterpiece. That's the film he has never equaled.

Long as we're speaking of Anime, let's bring in Galaxy Express 999. Even though I didn't see it until I was around 20, it gave me such feelings of nostalgia.

Serial Experiments Lain, which slowly hypnotizes and mind-expands and is an unequivocal masterpiece. The artwork is some of anime's very best. Our dear Ebert would be well advised to see it. If I could make only one anime recommendation, this would have to be it. (He says he has seen Perfect Blue already.)

Thanks Roger! Thanks commenters! You've inspired me to finally go public with Sita's Distribution Plan:

http://blog.ninapaley.com/2008/12/28/sitas-distribution-plan/

Ebert: Sounds like a winner. Be sure to bring some DVDs to Ebertfest.

Something came to me in a dream last night after reading this blog, and viewing several YT clips from SSTB.

I could see several lawyers having serious concerns over the controversial nature of setting a revered Hindu story to one of their properties (i.e, recordings of Annette Hanshaw). They fear litigious backlash at worst - bad publicity at least - from the Hindu community.

They figure the risk isn't worth it and decide to use the copyright law as a means of suppressing this enterprise so they don't have to deal with the possible outcry.

Of course, in my dream, this was all in technicolor and set to some Keystone Kops music.

Paul Marasa: have you read the novel Flicker? One of the characters does something that sounds very similar to what you describe Joseph Cornell doing.

Well, I wish the distributors would wise up. Kids movies are the most successful movies at theaters (let's not count "Delgo", which is in a stinker league all on its own). I used to work at a movie theater and the most successful movie there was "How the Grinch Stole Christmas", starring Jim Carrey. If distributors invested money into "Sita Sings the Blues" like they would for typical kids movies, which make hundreds of millions of dollars domestically virtually every single time through just the theaters--let alone the DVDs etc.--, it would make at least 5 fold the profit margins because it is a low-budget movie. And that's where they can take up to 50% of the profits. So, it would be in their best interest to start advertising the movie a lot, or to a lesser degree maybe, if they are not feeling comfortable going that far, do a little research as to where certain theaters in the country always bring in the most money for kids movies, send up some trailers at those theaters in those cities and theaters, and release it at the chosen few that statistically always bring in the most for kids movies and then the when: perhaps releasing it in the summer or winter time, when most big hits are released. And kids movies are always hits. So, they can optimize their advertising (advertise most in certain cities at those certain theaters where they are already advertising some other kid movie--throw in "Sita Sings the Blues" as a trailer too--it doesn't have to be in Burger King happy meals etc all over the country), and then let it compete against whatever typical Disney movie or whatever that sells out at those theaters, thereby, taking in a piece of the action (a kind of trickle down effect). Or they can just go see "Sita Sings the Blues" because they made a better choice. Hi, Oscar...I'm looking in your direction.

................"but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?"

Ebert,

What is the deal with you description of "spineless" husband? The story has Rama being sent to forest for 14 years by his step mother so that his step brother can be a king. Sita simply follows Rama.

I am disappointed that you decided to color a different culture's story withy our own opinions (obviously based on the standard christian propaganda done in the west). I would have expected a little more balance from a person of your stature.

Ebert: I was thinking also of the American husband, and making a small attempt at wit.

Roger, now that Sita's plight has been heard by the distributors, I think we should move to the next subject of the post. The moral of your post seems(if I can be bold enough to decipher it for you) to be that you should allocate the seventh day of the week, on the DVD's that you get by mail.

If so, you have to get a bigger mail box. Or should I ask creative community to get really creative and just forward a youtube link to you ? Just my 42 cents......

sorry for this useless post...now that we seem to have a happy ending for this film and your entry has at least served its purpose of sharing a possible good movie, I am only seriously trying to lower the average IQ rating of your blog.

Ebert: Speaking only of the blog comment threads I've seen, I think ours ranks pretty near the top.

This looks like an incredible work of love. Great to read about the various avenues Nina could take to copyleft her film, and I can't wait to see it.

I'm so please to see this little film getting such positive buzz, I saw it last fall at the Tallgrass Festival in Wichita and was just enchanted. It's not always easy to be a movie fan when you have to fight to see the best of what the art form has to offer.

I'm so please to see this little film getting such positive buzz, I saw it last fall at the Tallgrass Festival in Wichita and was just enchanted. It's not always easy to be a movie fan when you have to fight to see the best of what the art form has to offer.

Mr. Ebert, long time fan. I just wanted you to know that your blog is endlessly empowering for indie animators/filmmakers/students like myself. I saw Sita Sings the Blues almost on a whim at a special screening at Disney's Redcat theater in Los Angeles in September and fell completely in love with it. I think your actions in helping to secure a future for this fantastic film are not just inspiring, they are heartwarming. More power to you!

Earlier today, I was visiting Harlan Ellison's website, Ellison Webderland (apologies for not providing the link, which I have no idea how to do). In the blog section, Unca Harlan's Art Deco Dining Pavilion, HE and his company of commenters have frequently discussed Harlan's problems with people who put his copyrighted works on their websites without first obtaining legal permission. As you may know, Harlan is a fierce guardian of his copyrights; he was one of the first authors to form a company (the Kilimanjaro Corporation) to protect them. If you don't clear it with him first, Harlan can and will take you to court - and he has bullt up an imposing body of case law over the years. To Harlan Ellison, the copyright laws are firm and set - and he has been around long enough to remember when they were far less so. Now I know this not the same situation that Nina Paley faces in using old songs: the Tin Pan Alley songsmiths were employees, writing music to order as a commodity for the publisher's control. Whatever royalties they were able to score had to negotiated the hard way, with little if any thought given to "shelf life" - no one in the 1920s gave very much thought to whether their works would still be around eighty years down the line. I would guess that the present day holders of these song copyrights - or their lawyers - might mount the argument that they're looking out for the descendants of the original composers, that they may pass along a little (very little) of the newly generated revenue to them. Or something like that. /*/*/ THe problem seems to be that when the copyright laws were changed, it was one-size-fits-all. It only makes sense that an individual author, like Harlan Ellison or even maybe Roger Ebert, should control his own work for his lifetime, without having to go through legal rigmarole every fifteen or twenty years to maintain it. At the same time, work produced for hire ought to recieve more flexible controls, especially with so much time lapsed since its creation. THe fair answer would be some kind of sliding scale, with one low rate for an independent like Nina Paley, and perhaps a rising rate table for wealthier producers. But that's Utopia, which is not in the offing any time soon. I hope Ms. Paley can beat the system, and I wish her and you good luck.

Roger, you provide a real service to movie watchers. There is no doubt I would have lived my whole life without ever having heard of this movie, and now I want nothing more than to watch it. I checked out Nina Paley's distribution plan and am speaking with my wife about what we can do to free this movie.

Again, thank you.

I was fortunate enough to see Sita back in November, along with two other excellent animated features, Bill Plympton's Angels and Idiots and Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir. Ms. Paley's creativity in making Sita was astounding that NEEDS to be seen on the big screen. I couldn't help but relating it to the plight of The Killer of Sheep. Let's hope that it doesn't take 30 years for Sita to get a general release.

Neil Gaiman, who co-wrote the screenplay for Beowulf, talks of his own experience in adapting the Ramayana to an animated screenplay in the interview below. I get the impression that Neil has real insight into the epic.
http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/whatson/exhibitions/ramayana/podcasts.html

Interestingly, he describes his own frustration that Sita is too passive in the original.

I'd just like to follow up Jennifer's comment, way way up there on December 26 at 7:45 pm, by saying that *everyone* here in Santa Cruz remembers Nina Paley. My ISP, Cruzio (www.cruzio.com) still uses a logo drawn by Nina Paley. Recently I wore a Cruzio t-shirt to a party, and immediately someone asked me, "You know who drew that logo, don't you?" (spoken in a reverential voice) I didn't, but I do now.

So as a person living in Santa Cruz, I found Roger Ebert's review and this comment thread to be marvelously upside down. To most readers, the Ramayana is a famous legend and Nina Paley is someone they know nothing about. To me, Nina Paley is a famous legend and the Ramayana is something I know nothing about!

The point being that someday, both Nina Paley and the Ramayana will be legends, and symmetry will be restored to the world.

P.S. Nina was also one of the first cartoonists to start putting her work up on a fledgling thing called the Internet, back in the early '90s. So she is also famous among fans of webcomics.

I'm so happy to see this little movie get a mention on this blog. And happier still to know that you immediately felt its pull. Like many others here, I've been following Sitayana's development over the years and it breaks my heart to see her work being held up by people who're basically shooting themselves in the foot. Oh well, at least she's resourceful enough to take care of it!

But this shouldn't come as a surprise to anybody given that the latest is that music companies now want Youtube to pay for the privilege of hosting music videos. There's a reason why the music business as a whole is in the doldrums.

Mr. Ebert- I'm 16 and have been a huge fan of your reviews for years. Since we're on the topic of intriguing animated films, I recall some of your older reviews of animated films, such as Final Fantasy: Spirits Within or The Prince of Egypt. Have you by any chance seen Final Fantasy: Advent Children? It is a gorgeous film to look at, although it's not exactly coherent most of the time. It is, in your own words, "a film meant to be looked at", though not necessarily understood.

I'm disappointed (but not at all surprised) at the calls here for the music's owner's rights to be negated.

The emotional argument always seem to be that "big corporations" shouldn't be allowed to own an artist's work. But that would mean artists could no longer profit by selling their work, except maybe by directly selling CDs they pressed themselves out of the back of their station wagon or tickets to live performances. When an artist sells his work to a publisher he is getting money NOW that might take years to get if he were to distribute it himself. And the time spent trying to self-distribute is only going to take time away from creating more art.

Annette Hanshaw is described as having "recorded prolifically", but how many records do we think she would have made if she had had to manufacture and hawk them herself? Just think that thru for a minute. There wouldn't be ANY Annette Hanshaw music for Ms. Paley to use if a record company had not gone to the enormous expense of setting up the infrastructure that made those records possible.

The companion notion that copyright should expire on the death of the artist would mean that no older artist could sell his work. Why buy what is going to be free in a few years?

The other argument seems to be that this music of Annette Hanshaw is somehow in danger of being lost or forgotten if this movie doesn't get seen. That's not true; there's an extensive collection of her work available on CD already, and they present her work without it being clouded under the artistic vision of someone else. It's possible this movie might drive some sales of those CDs... or not.

I'm an animator too. We animators like to think that we are the culmination of the arts, combining drawing, painting, music, acting, etc.... and that the other arts should be THRILLED to be drawn into our cartoon projects; so thrilled that they shouldn't even expect to be paid for the honor.

But the other arts may not feel that way. They may prefer to be presented on terms in line with their original vision. Remember that Stravinsky regretted being part of "Fantasia". (And I doubt that millions of children raced to buy Stravinsky albums because they saw that movie.)

The fees that the music's owners are asking are in line with what other artist's music from that period would be commanding. They are the same sort of fees that every other movie production out there has paid to use music they didn't create themselves. No one conspired to stop Ms. Paley from making her film. She paid for many other things she needed to make this film, but now the music upon which the whole film seems to depend is not worthy of compensation?

It sounds like "Sita" is a great film, I hope to see it someday, I actually contributed a small amount of money to its production earlier, but I'm disappointed it's being used as an argument to undo the potential for artists to sell their work to distributors and publishers.

Terrific discussion everyone. Thank you for highlighting the delightful film and its plight, Roger. I too have a short film that has languished in non distribution due to not having the cash to front for the music rights. Though the sum requested by the music publishers for my film is paltry compared to the sum asked for "Sita," I know what Nina's going through to some degree, and it is very frustrating.

I can offer some suggestions to Nina (and other filmmakers reading) that have come from my own research -- it's how I'm going to proceed with my film. First of all, self-distribution is a must! There are several excellent case histories now for successfully using digital & festival distribution and digital marketing to create a good revenue stream. Here is one of the absolute best resources for developing a plan to do this run by former sales agent Stacey Parks: FilmSpecific.com (Sign up today for her email newsletter. It's invaluable!) I'm sure Stacey will have Nina reeling with solutions in no time. From reading Nina's blog on the subject, I'm certain Stacey can help her with suggestions that aren't yet included. Though it is certainly satisfying as a filmmaker and filmgoer, theatrical distribution does not make money, for the most part. But once the plan is in place for self-distribution to raise funds, there are ways to get the film to theaters, even if you do it yourself.

Once that plan is in place, Nina could go to the publishers and see if they will work with her as a partner with a revenue sharing plan. Certainly, the music is a central element of this film which greatly adds to its charm. Nina's film, however, will do much to bring awareness of Annette Hanshaw to many more people who'd never know about her otherwise -- and at exactly the right time, as interest in 20's music is surging at the moment (at least in LA). Surely there's a win-win here somewhere. There is a time to fight the copyrights law, which I agree often creates absurd obstacles -- thanks Disney! -- but in the meantime, perhaps there are other solutions that appropriately honor the music's contribution to the film while allowing it to get out to a wide audience without bankrupting the filmmaker. Digital distribution has changed the rules, and publishers and rights holders now are presented with the opportunity to adjust -- to their own benefit.

Also, the Institute for International Film Financing may be able to help.

Meanwhile, I'll also forward Nina's story to a friend who works with copyright law every day -- I'm sure she's have some insights to offer.

@ Robert - 'm disappointed (but not at all surprised) at the calls here for the music's owner's rights to be negated.

I don't think anybody here is asking for the music owner's rights to be 'negated'. The issue here is that the music owners are behaving in an extremely shortsighted manner - Annette's wonderful music could have gained a new lease of life if the owners had been able to come to some sort of agreement with the animator and this movie was widely released.

If you've been a long time follower of Nina and her work then you know that more than a few people wanted to know who the artist was - in fact it's next to impossible to come out of this movie and not wonder about its music. Perhaps you can imagine how this might have translated to more revenue for her estate if they'd done the smart thing and come up with a re-release centered around Sitayana. In the long run they might even have recouped more than the money they're asking for.

Instead, now everybody loses. How clever.

@ Robert - The emotional argument always seem to be that "big corporations" shouldn't be allowed to own an artist's work.

It's not an emotional argument. It's an economic argument, and a civil rights argument: most artists do not support themselves through copyright, and in any case, now that we have a worldwide copying and remixing machine (the Internet), we should tune the system toward sharing instead of toward restriction.

Annette Hanshaw is described as having "recorded prolifically", but how many records do we think she would have made if she had had to manufacture and hawk them herself? Just think that thru for a minute. There wouldn't be ANY Annette Hanshaw music for Ms. Paley to use if a record company had not gone to the enormous expense of setting up the infrastructure that made those records possible.

It's not the recordings that are the issue here anyway, it's the compositions. But also, remember that back when Annette Hanshaw was making records, there was such a thing as a "master copy", from which the best copies could be made. Possession of that master was a de facto copyright, based in physics not merely in law, and the record company that held it was in a position to make the highest-quality sellable copies.

Today, by contrast, there is no such thing as a "master" (there's only "the first copy", but any copy can be a master with no loss of quality). Along with that revolution comes a revolution in the up-front costs of making recordings: any musician can do it, and can distribute the results at effectively zero cost as well.

So to summarize:

First, this wasn't about the recordings anyway. Second, at the time when your argument applied, the master copy was the real object of value, more than the copyright. Third, today all copies are masters and there are only tiny up-front costs to making and distributing recordings.

Finally, note that the preservation of Annette Hanshaw's recordings down to the present day was not due to the record companies responsible for caring for the masters. It was the collectors who saved her stuff, as is usually the case with such artists. By preventing people from making copies, we increase the risk of some artists' work disappearing altogether.

The other argument seems to be that this music of Annette Hanshaw is somehow in danger of being lost or forgotten if this movie doesn't get seen. That's not true; there's an extensive collection of her work available on CD already, and they present her work without it being clouded under the artistic vision of someone else. It's possible this movie might drive some sales of those CDs... or not.

See above about why we have those CDs. "Clouded" is an entirely undeserved term; remixing is the norm, not the exception, in human art.

But the other arts may not feel that way. They may prefer to be presented on terms in line with their original vision. Remember that Stravinsky regretted being part of "Fantasia". (And I doubt that millions of children raced to buy Stravinsky albums because they saw that movie.)

The original does not disappear when someone modifies a copy. Instead, both exist. Stravinsky would have very little right to be complaining about unauthorized re-use of his work -- he himself recast both folk music and composed music frequently! See http://www.questioncopyright.org/stravinsky_and_copyright for more on this.

The fees that the music's owners are asking are in line with what other artist's music from that period would be commanding. They are the same sort of fees that every other movie production out there has paid to use music they didn't create themselves. No one conspired to stop Ms. Paley from making her film. She paid for many other things she needed to make this film, but now the music upon which the whole film seems to depend is not worthy of compensation?

You speak as if she's compensating the music itself. The music, believe me, has no need of the money. Nina, on the other hand, does. The fact that many people in the past have had to pay such high rates of extortion is no justification for continuing the practice.

If you can speak with a straight face of music having "owners", you're already in a different universe from most actual musicians (a few outspoken monopolists notwithstanding).

So having discovered this, does that mean you are going to rethink your 8 day week pile?

Ebert: I'll start on it this Thursfriday.

Roger - thanks for bringing attention to this great film! I saw it largely by accident at the Seattle International Film Festival this May and have been hoping for a wider release ever since. Being near Seattle I spent time at the Vancouver festival as well - shamelessly telling everyone I met in line not to miss the opportunity to see Sita while they could (even then the problems it was facing were pretty clear). It's such a shame that one can easily buy Annette Hanshaw's recordings online as mp3's (at Amazon.com) in a matter of seconds but when a great and unusual movie threatens to actually expand the potential audience the rights owners don't see it for the opportunity it could truly be.

Robert H., the issue is not as cut and dried as you seem to think it is. These are all songs whose copyrights fall within that narrow span of years whose expirations keep getting kicked forward along with "Steamboat Willie." It's not an issue of the "big corporations" owning and enforcing copyrights, but of them owning the copyrights indefinitely and enforcing them in an extortionistic manner.

If you watch the interviews linked above, you'll see Nina explain that she fully expected to pay a reasonable fee for use of the songs, and was blindsided by how much the publishers were actually demanding. These fees are not "in line" with anything, any more than a one-woman production is "in line" with the latest Pixar feature. And big films as well as small are constantly having their playlists altered by the naked greed of the music publishers and recording rights holders. Can you imagine what would have happened to "American Graffiti" had these current fees been in place in 1973?

Only a few of the songs used in "Sita" are well known enough to reasonably command a significant fee. I suspect the very people who are demanding the tens of thousands of dollars per song probably had never heard of most of these songs, let alone known that they owned them, before Nina came asking about them.

The Annette Hanshaw recordings in "Sita" are all in public domain, having not had their copyrights renewed back when such things were still required. The masters were destroyed for scrap metal by the record companies during World War II. Those CD releases you referred to were put together by collectors from surviving shellac 78s with no participation or permission from the original record companies (at least one of which has been out of business for decades anyway), and the publishing royalties on those discs would have been subject to the more reasonable government-mandated compulsory license fees for audio releases. These recordings CERTAINLY would have been lost and forgotten had the CDs been subject to the same royalty requirements as they're socking Nina with, or been under the control of the labels that recorded them. And how many viewers of this wonderful movie had even heard of Annette Hanshaw before encountering her in Sita? I know I hadn't.

No one is asking for the forced elimination of copyright protection. Just for common sense and fairness.

Roger, BLESS YOU for giving this fantastic movie a higher profile. I too saw it at the Redcat in LA, and I think it's a crime that it isn't in the running for the Best Animated Feature Oscar. Wait until you see it on the big screen!

I am sorely disappointed in this article and of your support of a movie that seems this offensive. My girlfriend and I have been avid fans of yours for a very long time. Your articles made me love movies, I have been reading you since I was nine. But this is pretty low. My girlfriend is Indian, her whole family is from India. She is not even a practicing Hindu but what she read in your article enraged her. She couldn't find the words, but even I, your average white guy, who knows what he knows of Hinduism from his girlfriend's family, got offended. I know I would be equally offended if someone had made a similar cartoon about Jesus and Mary of Magdalen (well, if I didn't, then many would). The salt on the wounds was your description of her booty and "bodacious boobs." Come on- I know you're smarter and more tasteful than that, this is peoples' religion, we're talking about here. My girlfriend and I are both very open minded people and are always open to critique and satire involving religion but this seems to be saying nothing intelligent. It seems to be something that was done out of spite for a break-up. My girlfriend is the first to admit that she hasn't had the best history with Indian patriarchy but this is making no statement that we can see other than altering someone else's religion (especially one that is so hyped and misunderstood by white Americans- myself sometimes included) for personal reasons. Why is it no American will watch an Indian movie about Hinduism but will jump on the band wagon when an American makes a movie about it. And lastly, I would like to note that you have always seemed to be very unbiased and really interested in the work of broke no name renegade filmmakers, the fact that she was the daughter of the mayor made you look again and watch the movie is pretty superficial. I don't know who wrote this article, but it wasn't the intelligent, unbiased, distinguishing Ebert that I am used to. Are you becoming one of those hip, new age idiots that "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls" satirically skewers?

Ebert: The line about the mayor was intended as humor. Regarding Sita, I was referring to the character in the movie, not the religious figure. I can see how my comments appeared offensive, but if you see the movie you may feel a little better. It is affectionate, not offensive, and Nina Paley identifies with Sita.

I am eagerly hoping that filmmaker Nina Paley's current efforts pay off, and that Sita sees a distribution. Copyright laws were intended to stimulate creativity, but their current incarnation stifles it instead. As an artist myself, it's clear to me that all art is derivative to some degree, and new viewpoints on old work is an important part of art. Copyright was supposed to ensure that an artist and his family was adequately compensated for his work. That is certainly not the case now (and hasn't been for a very long time). Particularly with music, the artist rarely sees more than a pittance from the work he produces; the corporations who end up owning the copyrights get all the money.

Someone else mentioned that such corporations are necessary to ensure that an artist has a sufficiently wide distribution; and to an extent I agree. However, more often than not, those same corporations restrict an artist's distribution, if they don't think that they'll make enough money off it. And since they own the copyrights, the artist has no other options available for distribution, and loses all control over his own work; while receiving little or nothing for it. He's not even allowed to self-distribute his own blood, sweat, and tears. Many of the music writers and perfomers of the '20s through the '50s, particularly black blues and jazz artists, died penniless while exploitative music companies made themselves rich and became the megacorps we see today.

And when the artist has been dead and gone for decades, who should be benefiting from his (or her) work? His estate? How many generations of descendents should be allowed to leech off of artistic endeavours they had no hand in? Immediate family I can understand, since that is often their livelihood. But children eventually grow up; and by then they should be making lives of their own and supporting themselves, not leaching off of dead ancestors. Life of the artist plus 50 years is much more than adequate for the purpose of protecting artists.

Current copyright law does not exist to support artists, or artists' families. It exists almost entirely to support the greed of a few megacorporations like Disney. This should not get in the way of an individual expression of artistic vision like Sita.

Just wanted to mention that Nina Paley is also the creator of one of my favorite comic strips of all times: Nina's Adventures. To browse over 100 N.A. strips go to Nina's page at the Cartoonist Group and press the Search button.

... or if you only have time for one, try this.

I only watched the trailer (which I really couldn't tell much from one way or the other), but it sounds like a case of bad planning. If your film depends heavily on specific copyrighted elements, isn't it self-defeating to make the entire film before securing a deal for the rights? The copyright holders aren't wrong to tell you to pay up.

I do think there is a copyright revolution coming (who doesn't?), but that it's going to be from the artists' side of the equation. These companies are never (ever) going to give up their property.

Also, I just want to add a thank you for writing about the film. I didn't have much reaction to the trailer, and sort of forgot about it. There's no advertising more convincing than the words of an intelligent film critic.

Truth is.... People from Urbana ROCK!

I can't believe you waited so long to view something created by a "girl from Urbana!"
Thank goodness for wise friends like Betsy :-)

Ebert: Smile.

Hello Aaron--I would like to encourage you (and your Indian girlfriend) to actually see the film before you go and make judgements and assumptions about it and its intentions. Like your girlfriend, I am also an Indian. But unlike her, I am a practicing Hindu...and quite religious, for that matter. I have seen "Sita Sings the Blues" twice at two different screenings here in New York City--the first time with my wife (also very Indian; also very Hindu) at the Tribeca Film Festival in April. And then the second time at the Museum of Modern Art in November, this time bringing my wife as well as our two young children (ages 12 & 10). Like Mr.Ebert says in his reply to you, I can assure you that this film is not offensive to Indians or to Hindus. In fact, I was quite impressed with the amount of research on the Ramayana Miss Paley must have put into creating "Sita"--a film which is, ultimately, incredibly witty, imaginative, entertaining, and touching.

Ebert: Way off-topic, but something tells me (and you know what it is) that we both love the same Indian novelist.

ROGER: Not having read all the comments, I may be repeating one, two or more of them, but better that than no comment: "Sita" has been seen in Chicago, albeit briefly. I saw it in October at the Chicago International Film festival and loved it. (I can't remember whether it had two or three screenings). I thus was curious to read your journal entry. It would be wonderful to see it again (in general and to find some (many?) of the things I know I missed, so I certainly hope that your interest will help that happen. Happy New Year, too, by the way!

Roger:
Thanks for letting us know about this movie; like a few others have said here, I'd never heard of it before your mention here, and now it seems I want nothing more than to get a chance to see it. Copyright law and its growing incompatibility with modern technology has been bugging me for a few years now, and this is an excellent example.

I've always liked your way of asserting firmly that animation is "not just for kids". Talking to my father, who is intelligent but shortsighted in a few frustrating ways, you would think all animation (or "cartoons", said with a dismissive and insulting connotation), even masterpieces like Princess Mononoke, was intended to be viewed on Saturday Mornings by elementary-schoolers.

If you have really gotten a chance to read this comment, I'd like to reiterate a recommendation by a previous commentor. There is a Japanese animated series (made as a single season, like many are, of 26 half-hour episodes), that you might take a chance to view above all. Do yourself a favor someday and view at least the first DVD of the series "Cowboy Bebop". By the series' end, it manages to alternate between exciting, funny, brilliant, silly, and simply amazing. There are others who will tell you the same thing (perhaps more eloquently) - I hope you might find out for yourself.

I have been a part of exhibition industry in Bombay for many years. And I would be pleasantly (very) surprised, if this film gets a release. I was fortunate to watch it in Denver but am sure back home things will be viewed differently.

Indians are 'laid-back' and 'tolerant'? Well, I would believe so. But...they are also quite 'sensitive', and...the political system is such that you are always looking for agendas to be in the limelight.

What this film does - makes fun of (Lord) Rama; for me, it works; for me, it makes sense, and I could even seen it in good humor. But...it doesn't work that way with a character, rather a GOD, who is the supreme being in a country full of Hindus.

Eventually, you will see that we are not that 'tolerant'!

This film will not be viable even from a business perspective, though it could perhaps get a 'look-in' at some festival, if it has (ironically) a low-profile.

I can visualize a meeting of top multiplexes, wherein they shall straight away rule out playing this film - this film would be deemed as offensive and 'disrespectful', plus you don't want an unnecessary hassle as the only people who shall 'love' this film would be the political junkies. They would love it plays, so they can some and stop it with their violent protests. Even if the controversy creates extra interest about the film, it will not get the monies. So yeah, a pity that it would be a dead-duck.

There are people who would appreciate such a film but alas won't get an opportunity. Yeah, 'blues' galore in the land of tricolor.

Hello Roger and all,

Following the lead of some earlier posters about good animation and animators who have created an "oeuvre", I humbly propose our local Quebec hero : Frederic Back. http://www.fredericback.com/

The financial woes of "Sita sings the blues" raise an interesting point : Frederic Back did most of his work in a state funded institution, with, apparently, total creative freedom. Is this a workable model for others?

Hum. I realize that I have now become a true fan of Roger Ebert. Therefore I will allow myself a gushing comment: Roger's reviews and Journal are like the acorns planted by the man in "The man who planted trees". Each one small and complete, seemingly inconsequential, but adding up to an "oeuvre" that encourages critical thinking and enriches the word of film. I will even push the metaphor a little further and propose that each of the essays in the Journal creates a blooming of comments, a whole ecosystem of thought and reflection, enriching the readers and participant's lives.

Thank you, Roger. Best wishes for 2009,

Michel Lamontagne
Quebec Canada

I am happy to share with everyone that the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio will be showing this feature in February...who says the Midwest isn't avant-garde?

The music-holders won't settle for a percentage? Dumb.

So, too bad there's nobody out there any more who could do music *very similar* for a few thousand and a percentage. Yep, nobody.

@Robert H:

Thanks for coming in and playing the role of corporate shill. With any luck, we're seeing the rapid demise of your ilk with the collapse of the music industry.

Despite the lack of copyright "protection" artists have been producing art for centuries. Leonardo wasn't dissuaded from painting the Mona Lisa despite the lack of an 80-year guarantee that nobody could legally draw inspiration from his work.

Undoubtedly some corporate stooge somewhere would try to copyright the art in the caves of Altamira if they could. As someone else pointed out, the demand for Hanshaw's music would likely increase dramatically if this film were allowed to be released. Instead, nobody is going to hear about her.

This is the genius of corporate America, and is why I, for one, am applauding the demise of our corporate dinosaurs.

Nina has posted a new update which people need to see:
http://blog.ninapaley.com/2009/01/05/donatin-for-sita

People can now make donations to help "free Sita".

Thought you'd be interested in my take:

http://copyrightsandcampaigns.blogspot.com/2009/01/sita-sings-copyright-blues.html

It really is a wonderful, wonderful film. A good friend of mine did the sound for it, and I got to see it when it was at Tribeca. I've got to say, I think reviews will be good enough that enough people will come to see it, and the distributors will still make money on it. I wish they'd be a little gutsier -- this film deserves it.

I saw this film in Montreal last year and was so stunned and enchanted that I emailed Nina Paley when I got home from the theater. It truly is a one-of-a-kind, delightful movie. I was drawn to it because I love the music of Annette Hanshaw, but even I was skeptical when I read the description of the film in the newspaper.

At the end of the showing I saw, the audience stayed seated through the credits, clapping for Annette Hanshaw and the director. (Paley was not present.) I had never seen that before. I hope that soon the film will get the distribution it deserves.

Sita Sings the Blues is going to be broadcast on New York PBS station WNET Channel 13 Saturday March 7 at 10:45pm on the series Reel13.

Check out http://www.thirteen.org/artsandculture/sita-sings-the-blues-on-reel-13-and-online

Man, I had the chance to see this at the Chicago Film Festival last year and I missed it. I wanted to go but couldn't get the scheduling to work out. If I had known there would copyright/distribution issues, I would've made it a priority.

Roger - I hope you might post an official update to share this, if you find the time: the film can now be viewed in its entirety on the thirteen.org / reel13 website, in anticipation of its airing on March 7th. It's slightly small, but it's very accessible to anyone with any sort of broadband internet.
http://www.thirteen.org/sites/reel13/indies/indie-sita-sings-the-blues/241/

Additionally, Nina and her crew will be releasing the film for free download in (presumably) multiple formats of varying quality, all the way up to "freakin perfect but also huge" size, on or before March 7th, to coincide with the PBS/reel13 airing. This means that people will probably gain the ability to download the files for a DVD version, burn them onto a blank DVD, and give copies away, per Nina Paley's wishes.

Nina Paley has just released a high quality downloadable version at Archive.org. (Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike License) There are two SD ( standard definition) MPEG 4 files. A downloadable DVD and HD version may come later in the year.

"As the artist, I want the highest quality versions to circulate; it’d be sad if a super-compressed capture started torrenting first. Together, we can keep quality high!"

http://www.archive.org/details/Sita_Sings_the_Blues

Dear Roger,
I just watched the film last night on my local PBS affiliate (Channel 13 in New York) and found it utterly charming. I am of Indian descent (though not Hindu) and did not find the film offensive as it clearly positioned itself as the process of an "outsider" trying to understand the ancient story in her own terms. The inclusion of modern Indian voices trying to recall the tale from memory helped to lessen the potential for disrespect by showing that all of us try to understand the legends of our cultures in different ways.

I also fully believe that, as you stated in response to some of the comments contending that this take on the story is offensive, one really has to see before one judges, whether the work be "The Last Temptation of Christ," "The Passion of the Christ," or the work presently in question.

However, even I winced when I read your phrase "It tells the story of a brave, noble woman who was made to suffer because of the perfidy of a spineless husband and his mother." I realize that you likely intended to be irreverent rather than disrespectful, but my fear is that many Indians might be put off from giving the film a chance as the impression one can get is that this is the message one takes away from the tale of the Ramayana by watching this film.

As a point of comparison, an equivalent sentence might describe the gospel story as "the tale of a spoiled divine son who can impress the masses with his super powers but can't save himself from execution." Both phrases deny the deeper theological significance of these phrases. I realize that such was not your intention, but I just thought it would be good to understand that the tale of Rama is as deeply revered by many Hindus as the story of Christ is by Christians. Reverence certainly has its extremes, as amply demonstrated by the Babri Masjid incident (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babri_masjid), but that's another topic entirely (and one slyly alluded to by one of the Indian voices in the animated film).

Best regards,
Max G.

i just watched this on google video, my two word review

delightfully bizarre

i had 3 months to prepare to see this ; and i was still surprised

i cant imagine what it was like to watch the dvd cold

thanks roger

This is one of the most creative animated films I have seen to date. Bravo on the Creative Commons license- would be great to see a groundswell of support!

As Sumana mentioned, Hindu epics, which I am more familiar with teach us about making hard ethical choices. They give us mortals, moral compass when we are faced with the situations.

King Rama to prove his credibility as a fair ruler had to address washerman and other kingdom subjects' comments, although, upto the point HE had proved himself as devoted husband.
Having said that, I welcome different and feminine slant on the epic because growing up most girls in India would wonder IF HE WAS GOD WHY SITA HAD TO SUFFER. Here, I would go with Zach Brutsche's theory of cosmic bend. And may be that is why in Hindu temples both RAMA and SITA and brother LAXAMAN are worshiped as an exemplary trio.
I wish success to the film!

Ebert: Another reader from India. We are welcoming so many here!

A wonderful movie. The story of Ramayana thankfully has no copyright, and the tale has always been used by anyone has heard it to project their own versions of right and wrong, and versions that were more coherent probably survived. Personal interpretations of a timeless story has been pretty much the reason why they became timeless.

I do not think a movie of such emotive depth could have been created if Nina were not going through what she had to. In this aspect, I see it as more Indian than anything else, the art being just an extension of a personal emotion.

I am Indian too btw. While this movie is not the one to see if you need to know Ramayana - and it works in a completely deeper way if you have heard or read the story before.

Believe me that no reasonable (the non religious zealot types) Indian will ever get insulted by Nina's take on a popular story. My ex-gf and I sat and watched it together, and cried our eyes out, and somehow I feel Nina's take played out in my real life too. Hopefully it does not jinx other couples who watch it ;) .. In which case, please also dont read Ramayana

Ignorance of what sustains us in decency (sheets and sanctuary thrown to Sita, on Ceylon or wherever) is a serious (and transitive, you disrespect worriers in proxy to Rama,) failure. Wasting your date's 30s; sorry, slaying demons in the wilderness at less peril than that is an important takeaway for anyone.

Alternately for fans of the hidebound reading; Marriage gets you decades of witless peril punctuated and hung by Pyrrhic challenges the gods scarcely pass, and duty to your ugly aunts' evil whims. (Getting calls to affirm citations to them would be the icing; yes, dropped gemstones where feasting demons would have been the obvious choice...yes, 13 years, no deer...)

Writing follow-through Vedas for a living is the offensive part. This interpretive stuff is all joy.

Superlatively; that hobbies of S.O. on travel in the wild will include mining, gem crafting, smithing, spinning and weaving, but not animal capture and kenneling. Dwarf Fortress Embellished.

I love vector art. Smoothing is a non-issue since motion is an XML element above SVG or Flash deliverables, with several handy attributes for those uh...incarnations. So I'm shrugging off the 1080p torrents (740p looks lovely) to remix source and dub in songs I like...maybe a Blu-Ray side-looking feature.

Come to think of it, if Rama had been ski bumming with a cloud of consorts, what time would be be permitted to slack on capturing the deer or calling for a review?

Ebert: I had to read this twice, but it was worth it.

@Steve Nordquist:
If you want to try a trick with your blu-ray player, I have taken the liberty of adding a torrent along with the other ones I created, for a burnable version (in glorious 720p) which will fit on a single-sided DVD but plays on certain blu-ray players at blu-ray quality (720p anyway). It's on the official "sitasites" wiki page. Google "AVCHD" for more info.

Wow! I just saw "Sita Sings the Blues" at EbertFest this weekend -- what a lovely, lovely film! This is the kind of film that truly deserves to receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Feature Film (much like Marjane Satrapi did last year for her animated feature "Persepolis"). It was smart, funny, touching, and just plain gorgeous. Kudos to Roger Ebert for choosing such a wonderful film for his festival this year!

I was also able to catch "Sita" at EbertFest this past weekend and thought it was marvelous. Congratulations to the filmmaker, Nina Paley, on a truly remarkable feature film debut! I look forward to seeing what she does next.

I enjoyed "Sita sings the blues" at ebertfest as well. I don't think I have ever seen anything quite like it before. Listening to Nina Paley speak after the screening made me frustrated that all this music copyright legality nonsense was keeping this beautiful film from getting the proper nationwide theatrical release it so obviously deserves. More power to Miss Paley for finding her own way of getting her film seen by as many people as possible!

I worry for this film. The copyright situation will eventually get sorted out and even if it doesn't this brilliant piece of art has been made and people get to see it. Now the worrying part is how it is being advertised. If you advertise it as a movie about the "Ramayana" it will offend for the simple reason, that the Hero of the RAMA-yana is not exactly portrayed in the most positive light. On the other hand, if it is described as an inventive animated film that blends humor, heartbreak and jazz while drawing parallels between the filmmaker's life and Sita's plight, I would say that the point of view of the film is clarified. The Ramayana has the same stature amongst Hindus that the Bible has amongst Christians. I worry that this film will draw the unwanted criticism of being offensive, when I feel that both Nina Paley and the movie is quite innocent of that charge.

My fiancee and I had the good fortune of seeing SITA at the Talking Pictures Festival in Evanston on May 3rd. Unfortunately, the film was screened using a third-rate digital projector which gave the images a very "blocky", low-definition appearance. Nevertheless, we were completely enchanted by the storytelling and staggered by Nina Paley's creativity. We can't wait to buy a copy of the film on DVD so we can appreciate it in its proper high-def glory, and I'm on board with you to do whatever I can to expose this amazing work to the broadest possible audience.

Roger, I think you should leverage your considerable influence on the Chicago Outdoor Film Festival to see if they'd screen SITA SINGS THE BLUES on one of the other six nights of the week in July-August 2009 when that big screen sits in Butler Field without anything being projected upon it. I'd be glad to help solicit sponsorships (or arrange a fundraiser) to cover the costs (security, labor, etc.) necessary to permit such a screening. [This wouldn't be unprecedented: Last summer, the City screened THE RIGHT STUFF on an "off-night" in conjunction with the One Book, One City program.]

Thanks Nina, for this wonderful gift of a movie, and thanks Roger for bringing it to the attention of a wider audience!

This is an utterly enchanting movie, easily one of the best animated works I have ever seen. It is a crying shame that this treasure is seeing such a limited distribution.

Wow, thank you so much for making me aware of this film. I read this post way back when you made it, along with your review, but I still put off seeing it because, well, it's an animated version of the epic Indian tale of Ramayana set to the 1920's jazz vocals of Annette Hanshaw.

Yeah, it's easily one of the best of last year, and certainly one of the best of this one. What an insanely entertaining and thought-provoking in that completely basic way that hits you deep in the gut. I'm tempted to purchase everything on Nina Paley's website simply to support art of this caliber - let alone art shared with the public for free.

Dear Roger Ebert,

first I have to thank you for pushing this film into the light of attention of the public when I already feared it to be vanishing in the shadows of film history, like so many other animated films.

But then again, I can't help to feel a bit dissappointed by your original assumption before seeing the film: "An animated version of the epic Indian tale of Ramayana set to the 1920's jazz vocals of Annette Hanshaw. Uh, huh." You even claim that "if you were to read that description in the mailer from your local art house, would you drop everything and race through driving rain see it? Uh, uh." Oh, how wrong you are!

Just a short note like that (accompanied by a single screen shot) made me buy the ticket for the premiere at Berlin Film Festival last year immediately, without having heard any word of recommendation, or read any reviews ever. Do you know why? Not because I'm particularly interested in Indian myth whatsoever. No. The reason was: someone made an animated feature film outside a big animation studio system, all by herself. And that almost certainly makes a great film.

The reason is simple: you can't produce a crappy animation film just like that, not like a photographic film. Anyone can shoot a live-action feature film without much trouble, and since anyone can do it there's a huge pile of crappy do-it-yourself movies around which aren't even worth the time watching them (amongst them the occasional masterpiece, of course. I'm not talking media determination here, but the relation of quality versus quantity, as you will see). Not so animated feature films. It takes a huge lot of time and determination to finish up a project like that, a lot more than film intellectuals ans critics around the globe seem to acknowledge.

Animating a feature film is a pain in the ass! You can only finish a movie like this when you really, really, REALLY believe in what you are doing, not just for a moment, but for years and years of tiring, meticulous production. I can only wonder how often Nina must have asked herself: is this really worth all the time and work? And that she always had the strength to answer herself: Yes! - is a miracle itself. And that also makes her film a miracle. It just had to.

Maybe you can only understand that point when you ever tried to animate something yourself (I tried, and oh how I failed). But to me it explains why so many animated feature films I have seen produced that way (that is, outside a commercialized studio structure like in Hollywood and mainstream anime) are so incredibliy great. Even studio productions in feature film length, especially in Japan, are an extremely tedious and meticulous affair that demands a lot of determination and love to what you are doing to even get finished, and that's what makes so much, I'd say, most animated feature films such wonderful, amazing and magic things.

I hope, "Sita" will have taught you that lesson, so that the next time an independent animated feature film crosses your way, you won't react with an "Uh, huh" but with expecting something magically wonderful, and I doubt you will be dissappointed. Animation has been marginalized over a century now. It is time that it finally gets the attention it deserves.

By the way, this year's Berlin Film Festival screened another two remarkable animation feature films, the one being Adam Elliot's hilarious stop-motion masterpiece "Mary and Max", the other being an Irish production called "Brendan and the Secret of Kells", probably the most beautiful animation film produced outside of Japan I've ever seen. The fact that both films, as well as last year's "Sita" and 2007's "Tekkonkinkreet" (which is still my all-time favourite film) where screen in the children's and youth film section in Berlin shows the marginalized status of animated feature films outside Japan, and especially in Germany, and that those films are really in the need of someone fighting for them. You did a great job on "Sita", but please don't let it stop there! The world is full of wonders, you just have to look for them, instead of shaking your head, mumbling an "uh huh" and walking off.

Best wishes,
rk,
Berlin/ Germany

Hello Mr. Ebert,
I was contacted by Ms. Paley's father, Mr. Hiram Paley, shortly after your film festival. I am bringing her film to my theatre in Champaign, IL this Friday, May 15 - May 21. It will be presented from 35mm print film and through my excellent sound system. I told Mr. Paley that he may hear small details he hasn't heard before! Mr. and Mrs. Paley will do some Q & A after the 7:00 pm show on Friday evening, and again after the 2:30 pm show on Saturday. This should be a real treat and I wanted to post it here with your permission.
Best regards,
Greg Boardman

Ebert: I advised everyone at Ebertfest to go straight to "Gomorrah." Your Art Theater, where I got so much of my film education, is an oasis and a cutural treasure.

My DVD version is now done (at least the first version thereof).
Users can go grab it at the following archive.org page:
http://www.archive.org/details/Sita1080pFLAC

It will be directly downloadable, but I ask everyone to consider using the torrent, which will help others get it faster, etc.

This DVD includes the director's commentary, full menus, 8 subtitled languages, and some other goodies. It will burn onto a single-layer DVD blank and play on most common players (except certain old or extra-cheapo players that don't handle burned movies well -- not much we can do about this at the moment).
-Drakar2007

I finally got to see this movie on May 12 at the Red Vic Movie House in San Francisco. I took a couple of my friends who didn't know much about the Ramayana, and we all loved it. I am not a Hindu, but like many Indian kids, Hindu and non-Hindu, Indian-American and Indian, I grew up with the Ramayana. I've read it in many different ways over the years - C. Rajagopalachari's version, the Kamba Ramayana (an 11th century Tamil retelling), comic books (there's a brief image of the cover of the Amar Chitra Katha comic book I had as a kid in Sita Sings The Blues). I can understand how the movie could be seen as offensive - after all, Rama is supposed to be the perfect man, and calling attention to his failings might seem like blasphemy, or at the very least, willful misunderstanding.

But let me tell you: Nina Paley is not the first to see or even to call attention to the contradictions within the story. Even as a kid, I had a very hard time reconciling the heroic Rama with the uptight blowhard who insisted that his wife walk through fire to prove herself, or who discarded her because his citizens were gossiping.

There are other troubling interludes left out of Nina Paley's retelling: one of the incidents that provoked Ravana to abduct Sita was the mutilation of Ravana's sister, Surpanakha, after she fell in love with Rama. And to acquire the help of the monkeys, Rama helped their deposed chieftain by assassinating (sniping from a tree) the monkey who had taken over as king. These were not the actions of an honorable man, as I saw it.

Many Indian artists have pointed out these contradictions in short stories, poems, plays, etc. I don't see what Nina Paley is doing as objectionable - in fact, it fits in with a fine Indian tradition of alternate Ramayanas. The ways in which we tell and retell a story says more about us as a culture than the story itself: and at this point, the Ramayana has become so embroidered in the retelling that Valmiki's original (if there is such a thing) has become somewhat lost in the mix.

From Ashok Banker's introduction to his Ramayana novel, The Prince of Ayodhya: "...would we rather have this democratic melange of versions and variations, or would we rather have a half-remembered, extinct, tale recollected only dimly, like a mostly forgotten myth that we can recall only fragments of?" I'd rather have the democratic melange, thank you. And I'm grateful to Nina Paley for giving my Ramayana back to me in such a beautiful and expressive fashion.

FYI: The film is actually now available for legal, high-quality download from the director's website: http://www.sitasingstheblues.com/watch.html

Thanks for this great recommendation Mr Ebert - it's something I never would have discovered otherwise. I am a grad student in Buddhism at UI in Urbana, so it's full of interesting connections for me too!

Just finished watching the film online, and LOVED it!! Two BIG thumbs up to Nina Paley on a remarkable feature film debut!

Mr. Ebert in your 4th graph you state: "This is a story known to every school child in America." Did you mean to write "in India?"

Ebert: No, although it might seem so.

I just watched Sita Sings The Blues today in Omaha at Film Streams which is our 2-screen art house miniplex. I felt like I was watching an amalgam of Bullwinkle, Monty Python stop-action animation and just the right dose of digital rendering. That only describes the visual. Paley's references from the Ramayana along with the modern day subplot and the tangential use of 1920's torch songs created a mandala of sensual richness that prevents an immediate comparison to other movies, animated or otherwise. This is a movie for fans of animation that don't feel satisfied from Pixar and are starved for a form of storytelling that keeps them challenged and rewards them with humor, sentimentality and surprises. I want to see it again. And with continued and maximum respect to you Mr. Ebert, I still do not know of a single school child in America that is familiar with the Ramayana.

Ebert: I wa referring not to the book but to the outlines of its story:

It tells the story of a brave, noble woman who was made to suffer because of the perfidy of a spineless husband and his mother. This is a story known to every school child in America. They learn it at their mother's knee.

Little joke?

Roger,

Can't believe you reply to comments 6 months after the blog was originally posted. And repeat questions at that. :) Incredible!

And it's SO soothing and pleasantly SHOCKING to see entire pages of well-written and (largely) mature follow-ups, when one shudders to even DARE look below a Youtube video. This place is an oasis.

Ebert: I agree. I am daily gratified.

It gives me a jolt to look at this entry six months later. At the time my mother was in the hospital with a stroke, I was facing possible jail time, and I was still recovering from drug addiction. I recall my state of shock looking at those comments responding to my original one. "I actually said something worth responding too?" were the approximate words that ran through my head.

Now I'm looking at what I've just written and the words in my head are "It's only been six months?"

Tonight, for the first time, I watched 'Sita Sings the Blues' on Youtube. I consider it practice for when I see it on the big screen. I watched it, not as an film buff who watches movies between trips downtown to get high, but as a filmmaker looking at the work of a fellow artist, one who's skill and obvious joy I hope to express in my work one day.

Only one more day of shooting on my first short; only one month before the 48-hour Film Project; only a few months before my movie is edited and complete;only less than a year before the next festival season.
I no longer have things I am waiting around for; I only have things I am looking forward to. For that, I thank the movies, I thank the people who made them, and I thank you, Roger, for your help along the way.

Russell

Ebert: Six months makes a big difference. The skies are clearing, one day at a time.

It's been months, and I doubt if the commenter will see this...but when S M Rana Chandigarh up the page quote Yeats up the page, I think it's not making the point he (she?) intends.

That poem, "The Second Coming," is a reference to the book of Revelations in the New Testament. Yeats wrote it partially as a commentary on the political situation at the time (and IIRC, WWI). A doctrinaire Christian would consider it theologically dubious if not blasphemous; for one thing, it weirdly conflates the idea of the Second Coming with the birth of the anti-Christ. At any rate, it's a description of an historical moment from one person's point of view in the form of an ominous, unsettling poem, not an interpretation of Scripture.

Yet the poem has become a classic in its own right. It's a genuine and enduring work of art...and no one for a moment thinks it's supposed to represent Revelations. If your intention here is to criticize the value of "Sita Sings the Blues," then I think by bringing up that poem you've undercut your own argument.

Sometimes it's really that simple, isn't it? I feel a little stupid for not thinking of this myself/earlier, though.

Saw "Sita Sings the Blues" last week here in Chicago at the Gene Siskel Film Center. It was terrific! I brought my two young daughters with me, and they give it two thumbs up as well. Congratulations to Miss Paley.

Next week SITA SINGS THE BLUES will become available on Amazon and Netflix, and we're asking you to help this small film sell big! Here's how...

We read your comments on this blog and enjoyed it very much. We think others would too, so we're writing to ask you to post the same to Netflix and/or Amazon to encourage other viewers to watch this amazing film.

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We at FilmKaravan have put our grass-roots efforts behind the marketing of this film out of passion for its message. Your contribution will go a long way to make sure this film succeeds.

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Dear Roger,

Great review. We are showing the film at the U.S. Embassy in London on July 29, with Nina participating in a Q and A afterwards via digital video conference from New York.

Reagrds,
Rakesh Surampudi
Deputy Cultural Attache
U.S. Embassy London

Watched the film yesterday, and it's as delightful as you say. Watched Persepolis the day before and it's still an astounding work. And both works have one lesson in common:

Don't piss off your girlfriend if she's an animator.

I recently moved to Paris, and the only way I've found of getting over the 10 euro ticket prices in cinemas here is to watch really good movies, and thanks to you, Roger, this was one of them!

I was strolling down the Champs Elysees yesterday afternoon, trying to find something playing that wasn't Harry Potter or GI Joe, when this sign from a branching street caught my eye. It goes without saying that I would never, ever have heard of Sita Sings the Blues if I didn't follow this blog, but as it is I recognised the movie instantly and practically RAN into the theatre based exclusively on my recollection of your blog entry months ago.

Needless to say, I was enchanted by the film from beginning to end, got many a laugh from the perpetually contradicting Indian narrators, and saw my weekend improve from a sweaty chain of fights against French bureaucracy into a cultural and musical experience, reinforced today by my discovery of the bohemian English bookstore-slash-writer residence Shakespeare & Co.

The only problem is that now I will have to recommend Sita to all my friends, relatives and acquaintances knowing that they don't stand a chance of finding this rare gem.

At any rate, thanks for heralding the advent of movies like this, as it can really make a difference!

Ebert: Shakespeare & Co. has been the Parisian touchstone for generations of Americans.

Finally! The movie has been uploaded to archive.org, where you can download, for free, it in glorious HD and watch it for yourself. There is even a 195.9 GB (yes, that's right) version! This movie had me smiling the whole way through. I highly recommend you download it, as it is totally worth it!

http://www.archive.org/details/Sita_Sings_the_Blues

@ Martin G:: You and your friends, relatives and acquaintances can find SITA SINGS THE BLUES on DVD at Nina Paley's website (http://questioncopyright.com/sita.html) and at Amazon. For those who are stateside, SITA is now available through Netflix.

Thanks for the great article, Mr. Ebert. I always listen when you comment on a film because it is usually accurate. I would love to see this film somehow. Where might I find it? I saw the clip on Cartoon Brew's blog before I read your article. I hope it gets distributed someday!

I finally got around to seeing this movie on Youtube. Wow. It reminded me of Persepolis in its bold use of flat animation and different locations, and also in its nontraditional use of the medium to tell stories for people older than Pixar's target audience. I can honestly say that I have never seen anything like it. And to synchronize some of the scenes to songs from the 1920s? And to not seem weird in doing so?

Plus, I applaud Nina Paley in her fight against copyright laws that suppress creativity, rather than encourage it. It made me think about whether I should copyright future works of mine or seek an alternate route, such as a creative commons license (which is what Sita Sings the Blues has).

For anyone interested, I include my thoughts about copyright law (and how it should be changed) on my blog: http://dreamsoflit.blogspot.com/2009/10/copyright-laws-in-america.html

I could finally see this marvellously simple version of the primary Indian epic today. I'm completely bowled by the sweetness ,charm and emotionally accuratacy. To be honest I've gained my first understanding of it as a human narrative. Ofcourse it would raise some eyebrows here. I've communicated my reaction on Nina Paley's blog. ( Coincidentally, it happens to be Diwali Day, the equivalent of Christmas, commemorating the events narrated in this very animation, which I saw with my family today.) Thanks for pointing out this film.

Ebert: How did the audience receive it?

The audience comprised my better half, my just arrived son and daughter-in-law from Mumbai who have come for the "Christmas" holidays, myself, and the dog who was crouching in terror below a settee due to the continuous cracking of fireworks which is an unchangeable feature of this festivity. Another is the strings of electric bulbs which decorate the house-fronts.

My wife who herself is an inborn artist and a lover of art and the proud owner of the biggest collection of books for children this side of the Himalayas was the one who really appreciated the brilliance of the two streams of animation. Since she has a love for Indian mythology she was completely knocked out by the psychedelic colours of the Indian half of the animation---the peacocks, the rainbows, the chariots, the lotuses, the eye-lashes, the hair---wow!

My daughter in law remarked that the portrayal of the two characters ( Sita's husband, Rama and the king of Sri Lanka who abducts her, Ravana) was a reversal of the way we have been ingrained to think of the epic since childhood. Ravana is the traditional epitome of evil and we have another massive festival in which gigantic cracker filled ten-headed effigies of Ravana are lit at dusk in the presence of massive gatherings throughout the country and you can hear the explosions across the town. Rama stands for nobility, uprightness, filial piety and a model for human conduct . Christ would e the closest paralell. Sita stands for the ideal woman, Madonna like. Complexities of the narrative have provided food for rather repetitious debate . Mahatma Gandhi took Rama as his own model and his last words (in the Attenborough film too) were " oh Rama!".

In any case, my daughter in law felt that Nina Paley's version seemed to be more logical since Ravana, apart from the reprehensible abduction, did not indulge in the misconduct for which he had ample oppurtunity. Rama acted caddishly, instigated by the remarks of a "low cast" washerman even though justifiable as a head of state. She too was thoroughly engrossed by the movie which we finished well past midnight as the fireworks continued to crackle in the back ground. Incidentally, when questioned by me prior to the viewing she couldn't tell me the number or names of Rama's step mothers or step brothers, and neither could I which we should have been able to, specially me. My wife son got all the names right

One thing the movie has done for me is to have thrown the epic in sharp episodic and emotional relief, making it a part of my lexicon and repertoire . In a way(far fetched comparison) Nina Paley has done for me Ramayana-wise what Branaugh did Hamlet-wise----taking me steps closer.

My elder son( who saw 90%) from Mumbai was taken by the colourfulness and said that it was clear that the viewpoint was feminist. The younger one, who works on line for a US based software company as per American timings was sleeping his week end off and saw only 10%. Earlier in the day both had been watching District 9 with high levels of satisfaction.

My family's reaction was neutral as far as religion is concerned. But I am absolutely certain my next door neighbour would have blown his top at what many, specially those with a particular political affiliation, might find sacreligious. Lots of folks, I think. The voluptiousness of the portrayal, for one thing.

The Ramayana (there are two versions, an ancient one in Sanskrit and another in Hindi around 1600CE) is a mellifluous poetical masterpiece of the Hindi tongue. Nina Paley's main achievement is to have captured that honey sweetness of the original which is it's essence that has always captured the heart of Indians.( The Anne Hanshaw blues music was the exact thing.) I have heard it ( Ramayana) being sung by poor rickshaw pullers on winter evenings around improvised bonfires( the latter version) .

It is sad that the name of Rama has become a weapon of ugly politics leading to the loss of many lives over the last two decades. This film cannot beshown in India in the foreseeable future.

Ebert: Thanks for this. I love it when a film engages people in theology.

I absolutely loved this film. So smart and funny and imaginative and beautiful and unique. Do you know if "SITA" is eligible to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature Film? This film reminds me a little bit of "PERSEPOLIS", another lovely indie animated feature by a woman filmmaker, which was nominated for that Award in 2008. I think it would be an absolute shame if "SITA" (and Nina Paley) did not also receive an Oscar nod! Has Nina Paley's unique "free" Internet distribution strategy helped or hurt her chances of receiving recognition from the Academy?

Just today watched the new Robert De Niro film EVERYBODY'S FINE, and noticed that there was a very funny actor in it who appears to be of Indian heritage (in the role of Kate Beckinsale's employee at her Chicago advertising agency). A quick search on IMDB, and I discovered that the actor is named Debargo Sanyal--and he also happens to be the voice of the hilariously sexist 'Rama' in SITA SINGS THE BLUES! I saw SITA at your Overlooked Film Festival, and thought it was truly fantastic. I wish SITA, and all the talented artists who were involved in creating it, all the best! SITA most definitely deserves all the praise and accolades that have come its way.

Folks who are in or near Manhattan should check out "Sita Sings the Blues" Dec 25th-31st, 2009, when it will be receiving its first-ever NYC theatrical run (one-week only!) at the IFC Center in the West Village. Complete details at this link-- http://www.ifccenter.com/films/sita-sings-the-blues/

The New York Times came out with their rave review of "Sita" two days ago (link- http://movies.nytimes.com/2009/12/25/movies/25sita.html ). You reviewed this brilliant film a full year before them, but, I guess, better late than never, haha! Very happy for Miss Paley and her amazing movie--I saw it at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2008 and fell in love with "Sita"! Season's Greetings to you, Mr.Ebert!

Saw it. Loved it. Thank you, Roger.

FYI, re: Stacey Ballard's posting, the IFC Center theatrical run of "Sita Sings the Blues" here in New York City has been extended. It is now playing December 25th to January 5th. Info is at the link Stacey gives above. I will be going to see it on New Year's Day--looking forward to it! And Happy New Year to Roger Ebert!

Checked out a screening of "Sita" today at the IFC Center here in NYC. What a beautiful film! It is pretty cool to know that one talented woman is behind this entire film--I find it totally inspiring actually :-) (I am a 17 year old female artist, and I like drawing comics, and doing computer graphic design) I wish Nina Paley all the best in her animation career. Girl Power!

In reference to Gretchen and Stacey's postings above, it looks like the NYC theatrical run of "Sita" has extended yet again. According to the IFC Center website, "Sita" will now be running thru January 12th. I saw it at the Museum of Modern Art in 2008, but, I think I may go see it again later this week. A fantastic film to see at anytime, but I feel it is most fantastic on a big screen-Nina Paley's awesome animation really pops on a big screen.

So let's say 30 years from now, Ms. Paley is still doing animation but ready to retire. She's had a lax career of medicore projects and has always had to maintain a "day job". All of the sudden there are previews for a new Pixar movie called Sita Sings the Blues using facinating new technology and the characters look remarkably similar to Ms. Paley's version. Nobody called Ms. Paley to ask permission but they didn't need it because others are "entitled" to her works and it really didn't hurt her because they downloaded 1's and 0's from her website (her words). Are you telling me Ms. Paley would be okay with this?

And how can Ms. Hanshaw's songs' composition be derivitive? They were reproduced, not a new work. Playing "I Will Survive" in two different movies does not make it two different works. (The Hanshaw performace is in public domain, the song itself is not is my understanding.) She could have certainly sought out alternatives such as hiring a contemporary singer with their own songs which are a dime a dozen or finding another blues great that doesn't charge so much (she mentions in the interview a figure of around $220,000). Of course you might suggest that that would be censorship or a compromise on her vision, but guess what that isn't censorship, it's a consequence of free speech and the first amendment gives her the right to choose as an artist and reap the rewards or consequences.

I enjoyed this movie very much but I was a little troubled when I heard her interview where she had such a cavalier attitude towards artists rights. Does she not know that she's fighting against her own interests? She most likely will be the victim of what she's advocating someday.

I myself am a filmmaker and I'm making what would be considered niche films that are not going to find a mainstream audience. Someday when I'm an old man and people finally find value in my craft, I'd like to enjoy the fruits of my efforts and would like my decendents to as well.

I just finished watching Sita Sings The Blues at YouTube. Thank you so much for recommending this movie. It is a masterpiece!

I promptly clicked through to the donation site, and made a modest contribution to the "Getting out of the Copyright Jail" cause.

Aside from sitting here in the glow of having just watched an amazing, funny, touching film, I am also feeling some awe for the Internet that makes it possible for me to have seen it. As a child, I dreamed of having a big house with a movie theater one day. Instead, I have a tiny apartment, and a laptop that allows me to see more great movies than that old-time theater ever could.

And the fact that I can learn about those movies from the keyboard of a mute film critic living half a country away from me! We live in a magical time.

Thank you, Mr. Ebert, for pointing me to Sita Sings The Blues. My life is better for having the opportunity to experience it.

Jen Kubeck
New Hampshire

Hi Roger,

I first read about Sita here in this blog post in December 2008 and just watched her this weekend. What a wonderful movie! Thank you so much for bringing it to our attention. I am sure that the critical acclaim for this beautiful, funny, and moving film helped broker the solution that led to its distribution. I'm so grateful.

Also, I totally didn't realize Sita's face was Betty Boop's until I saw the picture you have posted.

Thank you!
Sarah