Dirk Hardly in the Mystery of the Silent Bells /48hours 2008
Duration: 5:38
Dirk Hardly is called to investigate the reasons behind why the bells of the local church have stopped ringing. This was team Slapstick Surgerys entry into the 2008 48hours New Zealand film competition. We ended up winning the animation prize for the Wellington region, getting the movie shown in the Paramount cinema and having an extended shot of it used during the 2 hour live televised final on C4. The idea of the competition is that you get randomly assigned a genre, a prop, a chracter with a quirk and also a line of dialogue. Ours were: Mystery, A Brush, a perfectionist named Kerry Post and the line "Wait a minute". Then we get 48 hours precisely to script, record sound and video, edit and submit it. We went for an animation this year. The cinema audience loved it anyway, here were two anonymous reviews from unofficial judges: Steelpotato Team Name: Slapstick Surgery / Genre: Mystery / "Dirk Hardly in The Mystery of the Silent Bells" [Animated]On a dark Sunday morning, our hero drinks scotch (which he hates) and goes to Church to solve the crime of the bell that is not ringing, interviewing a nun and a priest with very poor eyesight who may hold the answer to the crime. Fucking crude, fucking hilarious. Story: 4 / Acting: 3.5 / Elements: 3 / Technical: 3.5 / Overall: 4.5 out of 5 Nomio: SLAPSTICK SURGERY - "DIRK HARDLY IN THE MYSTERY OF THE SILENT BELLS" - MYSTERY Awesome animated entry which nailed the mystery genre - this one going down the film noir avenue. Private detective Dirk Hardly is called to a church to investigate the mystery of the silent bills. It doesn't take him long to discover that the silence is due to the bellringer's untimely death - but who did it? The he-nun Kerry Post, the gentle Irish priest or someone else entirely? This entry must surely make the finals so I won't give anything away, suffice to say that rating could possibly be an issue... Some classic lines and beautiful animation with moving perspective reminiscent of old BBC series "Monkey Dust". Best use of the key prop yet - but I have only seen a few heats... Overall - 4.5 out of 5 Team Slapstick Surgery are: Anthony Scally (Animator/Editor, voice of Father Pat) Ash McPherson (Producer, writer) Grae Hunter (Artist, voice of Dirk) Richard Hallam (Sound editor, Voice of Sister Kerry)