Some Analog Lines is a playfully philosophical, surprisingly personal essay film that examines the dichotomy between digital technology and the artistic process of filmmaking. It is about animation, computers, clay, celluloid; a paper mask; a wooden shelf. More importantly, it is about what we respond to when we watch a film, and why.
Four encounters, each confined to a single room: a man helps a young woman remember her past; a husband and wife confront each other about their infidelities; a journalist interviews a famous author about the mysteries hidden in his novel; and a secretary visits her former employer to tell him how much she's always loved him. Each of these conversations could happen any day, every day – except that the young woman has been raped and murdered, the husband has died in a terrible automobile accident, the employer has perished in a fire, and the novelist has passed away from old age. The four intertwined stories weave a tale that is shocking, humorous, tragic and uplifting, in which secrets are shared, truths are revealed, and each of the eight characters comes to an understanding they could not have gained without the touch of death.
A woman drifts back to childhood memories of rural Texas where her discovery of the jawbone of a horse in a field leads to a fascination with, in her own words, "dead things." Her natural history collection of insects and bones takes on a supernatural quality when she finds the corpse of a strange creature that she believes must be a faery. Using still photographs, found objects and unsettling creations that briefly come to life via stop-motion animation (which evokes the work of the Brothers Quay and gives them an even more unreal presence), filmmaker David Lowery tells a phantasmagorical story, part fantastical mystery and part nightmare, as a primal memory. A CATALOG OF ANTICIPATIONS weaves imagination and experience into a haunting tale recalled in snapshots of recollection, a dark fantasy with a tactile texture that grounds it in the physical world and narration that frames it as a coming-of-age moment. - Sean Axmaker
