I received my copy of the beautiful Rustboy book in the mail today. According to the package it was shipped from Belgium, which for the moment is bringing forth an odd feeling of “rich and creamy chocolate” nostalgia. Anyways, back to the intended subject; Rustboy.
For those few who don’t know, Rustboy is a project (a CGI animated one at that) created, produced, animated and developed by one man, the talented Brian Taylor. Taylor decided to start this project a couple of years ago to see what kind of film-quality he could create using nothing more than his Mac, a shoestring budget and a whopping amount of imagination. The result was the captivating story of Rustboy, a slightly rusted robot boy who is initially intrigued with the world around him and eventually becomes bored and depressed through no fault of his own.
To say the visuals are excellent is not saying enough because this so-called “one man” project screams attention because of the vision and imagination that Brian Taylor has put into his creation. As it stands the quality of the film looks nothing short of Pixar-esque but with one exception. According to Brian he wants the film to retain a stop-motion animated look similar to the style found in movies like Nightmare Before Christmas.
In fact, Taylor explains on his website and in the book that one of his great influences is Tim Burton (of Edward Scissorhands and Beetlejuice fame). He also mentions inspiration from early Disney films (Pinocchio, Cinderella, Snow White) to older horror movie classics like Frankenstein, The Wolfman and Dracula. It’s also worth mentioning that this film shares many ideas with these inspirations and in that respect makes it even more geniune.
Do yourself a favor and simply visit Rustboy.com for more information about the 25-minute film currently in production and write Brian an email if you feel obliged, he’ll appreciate it.
