Man Bites Monsters

I intended to start this post by writing that I wanted to follow up the sad news of Ed Rondthaler’s death with some light-hearted stuff. Yet after thinking this through I realised how silly this would’ve been. Although the passing of a life is always a sad event, you have to admit that having lived until 104, been married to his wife for over 70 years and having three children, living life to the fullest with an exciting career, and admitting “it’s been lots of fun”, one can only be glad for Ed Rondthaler for having been so fortunate. So, vaya con dios, Mr. Rondthaler. These are for you.

Monsters: 091 Tourists from Volstok Telefunken on Vimeo.

The thing I want to show in this post has little to nothing to do with type, but I’m having a very rare bout of patriotic pride, so please indulge me. Man Bijt Hond (Man Bites Dog) is a daily light-hearted actua-show on één, Belgium’s prime national television channel. It is produced by the multi-awarded production company Woestijnvis (in English “desert fish”, which in fact refers to a famous mistake by a quiz candidate in the Flemish version of the Wheel of Fortune). One of the segments called De Monsters appeared three times a week in the past season of Man Bijt Hond. De Monsters consisted of approximately 30 second to one minute candid camera segments where funny reactions were elicited from unsuspecting bystanders. The actors who coaxed those bystanders were subsequently cut out of the scenes and substituted by whacky animated monsters who interacted with the bystanders in unexpected and often hilarious ways. This resulted in delicious but ultimately nonsensical sequences that displayed a bizarre sense of poetic humour.

Monsters: 040 Ballenbad from Volstok Telefunken on Vimeo.

The mini monster movies were conceived and designed by Volstok Telefunken – Thijs De Cloedt and Wouter Sel – with animation by Joris Bergmans, Kristof Luyckx, Michélé De Feudis, and Volstok Telefunken. Below are the five most popular clips according De Monsters’ own website, but all episodes can be viewed there, and 96 of which on Vimeo.

Monsters: 057 Straat from Volstok Telefunken on Vimeo.

Monsters: 028 ponygirl from Volstok Telefunken on Vimeo.

Monsters: 026 WEBA apen from Volstok Telefunken on Vimeo.

Monsters: 043 Hond Wassen from Volstok Telefunken on Vimeo.

Monsters: 046 Unief Elvis from Volstok Telefunken on Vimeo.

Tags: Belgium, funny, humor, motion graphics, television