Storyboard by John Lasseter for Knick Knack (1989)

            American postcard by Disney Enterprises /  Pixar Animation Studios, 2005. Image: Pixar Animation Studios. Storyboard by John Lasseter for Knick Knack (John Lasseter, 1989). From 'The Art of Pixar: 100 Collectible Postcards, published by Chronicle Books.

In the Pixar short Knick Knack (John Lasseter, 1989), a  snow globe snowman wants to join the other travel souvenirs in a hot party, but the glass dome that surrounds him gets in his way, despite all his efforts. 

'Knick Knack' is only four minutes long. It starts with a couple of souvenirs taken from vacation in Florida. We see some palm trees dancing and a beach bunny dancing on a nice little tune. Then we take a look at the other end of the table. A souvenir from Alaska, a snowman in a glass dome, wants to join the hot party and especially the hot girl. He tries to break the glass of the dome in any way possible. This animated short directed and written by John Lasseter is an impressive early film from the Pixar studios. Whenever John and Nancy Lasseter go on vacation, Nancy always makes a point of buying a snow globe from that particular place. It was from this practice that the initial idea for the film was born. The result looks great and is inventive. The ending gives us the biggest laugh, but before that, there are quite some funny moments. Knick Knack premiered at the 1989 SIGGRAPH convention in Boston and was presented in 3D. A year later, the film was awarded the prize for Best Short Film at the Seattle International Film Festival. 

In 2001, the British director Terry Gilliam called Knick Knack one of the ten best animated films ever made. The film was completely rebuilt and re-rendered for release in theatres preceding Finding Nemo (2003). In this version, the girl on the "Miami" knick knack and the mermaid in the fishbowl have undergone a breast reduction, and the mermaid is now wearing a seashell bra rather than just starfish pasties. This was done due to discomfort with the original version by John Lasseter, who by this point was a father and felt uncomfortable showing the original version to his children. The original version is no longer available, with its last release on Toy Story's Laserdisc version. All subsequent releases, including the Pixar Short Films Collection, feature the 2003 edited version. The old version can be seen in its "uncensored" form briefly in Toy Story 2 (1999). Knick Knack was one of the last pieces of animation that Lasseter would animate personally during Pixar's years as an independent company and it was the last short Pixar made until Geri's Game (1997).

Sources: Wikipedia and IMDb.

December will be Pixar month st EFSP! In the coming weeks, Bob, Truus & Jan Too! will share our collection of Pixar postcards with you at Flickr.

Taken on: November 1, 2021

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