Beijing animation studio 39°N presents a suitably creepy animated version of Neil Gaiman’s poem/short story Nicholas Was for their 2010 Christmas card. I’ll be honest, I’m not the biggest fan of the reading here but the look is fantastic.

Via Neil Gaiman

The holidays can be a trying time. Maybe you’re feeling frazzled after being bombarded for months by holiday advertising, holiday music, and various wars on holidays. Or maybe you don’t give two shits for these supposedly special days and are just feeling kicked around lately. Maybe you just want to chill out. If you find yourself in such a situation let me suggest sitting down and zoning out for two and a half minutes with the new song from Eskmo, a.k.a. Brendan Angelides, entitled “We Got More” which features a hypnotizing video by one Cyriak who has made a career of hypnotic animation. It may be the most relaxing two and a half minutes you have today.

The management would like to apologize for the spotty nature of the Friday Afternoon Movie over the past few weeks. Rest assured that the worthless hack responsible for the content of this feature is currently being flogged with rabid badgers. The management would like to assure our readers that, should the aforementioned hack survive the aforementioned flogging, the FAM will return next week with actual content. In lieu of this week’s FAM, please accept this video of a parrot singing Drowning Pool’s “Bodies”. We thank you for your patience and hope you have a pleasant weekend.

Nathaniel Lindsay’s Ducked and Covered: A Survival Guide to the Post Apocalypse addresses an almost completely overlooked subject in the world of informational videos: how one should go about daily life in a world ravaged by a nuclear holocaust when the remaining population has been reduced to a shambling band of mutants and/or have all resorted to cannibalism. I will admit I was skeptical at first, after all this video hails from Australia, a land populated by the worst England had to offer making its citizens decidedly untrustworthy, not to mention that their theories of what the world will be like after a cataclysm having a strange preoccupation with vehicular combat (no doubt due to the fact that when England founded this prison continent they made it illegal for citizens to own cars. Fact. (Editor’s Note: That is not a fact. What is it with you and Australia?)) Any worries I may have had proved unjustified as Lindsay makes sure to point out the real threat of post-apocalyptic civilization: killer robots. Killer robots with lasers.

Via The Daily What

The new live-action Yogi Bear movie is a thing that exists, of that fact there is no doubt and, unfortunately, no escape. Were it to end in the manner depicted here by Edmunde Earl, as a darkly humorous ode to the penultimate scene from 2007’s under-appreciated The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, it might have at least some modicum of value. This is, of course, not the case and we are left with the reality that, as previous mentioned, there is a live-action Yogi Bear movie. Starring Dan Aykroyd and Justin Timberlake.

Goddammit.

Today the FAM is proud to present perhaps my favorite documentary: 1999’s American Movie, directed by Chris Smith. American Movie tells the story of Mark Borchardt, an aspiring filmmaker living in Milwaukee. With the help of his best friend, the endlessly entertaining burnout Mike Schank, and various other friends, family members, and amateur actors, Borchardt attempts to finish his latest feature, the short horror film Coven.

All is not well, of course, and Borchardt’s life. A high-school drop out, he is mired in debt. His relationship with his ex-girlfriend and mother of his three children is strained and he has developed a bit of a drinking problem. And while he works hard at film-making and appears fairly knowledgeable, his ability to plan and manage his project is suspect. Even his own family have their doubts that Mark will be able to finish the film, his only support coming from his wealthy Uncle Bill who, in his old age, seems confused by his surroundings more often than not.

And yet they make for a cast of likable characters. Mark most certainly has his own personal demons to work through but Smith has no trouble letting him win over the audience with his can-do attitude. Uncle Bill, for all his rancor, does genuinely care for Mark and some of the most touching scenes are between these two. And of course there is Mike, a man whose mind is so ravaged by drugs and alcohol that is almost incoherent, yet whose loyalty and devotion to his friend is almost absolute.

It all amounts to the quintessential American story, the myth that has for so long symbolized this nation; a tale of hard work and passion bordering on obsession, of perseverance over adversity. In this way even the most lowly individual can make of themselves a success. In the same way, it is also a story of class. In stark contrast to Chris Smith’s middle-class background and film school degree Mark’s dream project Northwestern is told distinctly from his point of view from a working class family in the Midwest. His film is set against a backdrop of dilapidated building and rusty cars. “That’s what it’s all about,” he says “rust and decay.”

Despite these seemingly gloomy outlook, Mark remains unswayed in his decision to make movies. It is this almost delusional tenacity that lies at the center of American Movie and it is here where it truly resonates, showing us a modicum of hope where most would expect to find none.

From Italian Saturday evening television program Al Paradise circa 1984 comes Sara Carlson singing and dancing to “Fly To Paradise”, a choreography enthusiast’s wet dream. I cannot be entirely sure just what is going on with this leotard-clad nymph and her frolicking menagerie of break-dancing contortionists but nevertheless I am mesmerized by their sequined glory — a glory only outshone by Carlson’s fantastic chicken dance.

Thanks, Klaus!

Update: Mer points out in the comments that she totally posted this months ago and is way cooler than me.

Michiel ten Horn and company bring us a hallucinatory video for “Put It Back Down”, order a phrenetic new song from Dutch musician Seymour Bits, online a.k.a. Bas Bron. Slightly not safe for work, sickness specifically: animated breasts, pudendum, and a bizarre approximation of sexual congress.

Via Super Punch

WHITEPRIDETV.COM has a varied lineup of video content for the modern white supremacist to educate themselves and keep up on the latest in good old American racism. From This Is The Klan to The White Woman’s Perspective Thomas Robb and his group of camera wielding bigots cover the entire gamut of life as an ignorant douchebag. They also, thankfully, have some children’s programing to help Confederate flag waving parents educate their offspring in the proper manner.

The programming in question is The Andrew Show which is, in case you had not already figured it out, “A Show for White Kids” (Finally!). Plopping the blond-haired youth in front of a green-screened bookcase, WHITEPRIDETV.COM lets the little tyke go at it, tackling the issues that face white kids today. This particular episode deals with the film Marmaduke, an unremarkable film in nearly every way except for the fact that it is a metaphor for racial tension; specifically the denial of land to white people by people of other various and sundry races. So goes Andrew’s thesis, a thesis he does not expound upon his, presumably because his point is so self-evident even a child can see it.

It is an unfortunate reality that even the worst among the human race can procreate, taking an otherwise unfettered mind and twist it with their own, poisonous worldview. It is, perhaps, worse when they give them their own television show to parrot that moronic bile.

Via Videogum : The Daily What

Storms can make for some surreal imagery but Sean R. Heavey’s photos, taken in his home state of Montana, are simply mind-boggling. It’s hard to believe that these were taken on this blue ball and not some far off planet.