Nina Paley's Sita Sings the Blues was one of the biggest delights of the 2008 Ottawa International Animation Festival.
Inspired by the dissolution of her marriage in 2002, it's a brilliant film that mixed multiple animation techniques, 1920's jazz and ancient Hindu texts into a compelling gumbo. It has won multiple awards, including the Grand Prix at the 2008 Annecy International Animated Film Festival, Special Mention at the 2008 Berlin Film Festival, and an Honourable Mention at the OIAF as well.
In this exclusive email interview, Paley discusses the inspirations behind her film, and why she mixed Bollywood and jazz to create "an ancient tragedy combined with modern comedy."
Can you give me a mini-bio of Nina Paley, what was your background in animation up to the point that you started Sita Sings the Blues? What other projects would our readers know you from?
I started making animated short films in 1998, beginning with a borrowed Super-8 camera and some plasticine figures in my apartment in San Francisco. I am self-taught. Before I got into animation, I was a self-taught cartoonist. You can read my full bio here.
What do you feel were some of the advantages of being self-taught?
"I learned more, and continue to learn, and rely on my own voice."
What are some of the disadvantages?
"I'm disqualified from many teaching jobs that want those letters on your resume."
Who and what were some of your artistic inspirations for Sita? Whose work did you look to?
"Everything I saw in India. And everything I ever saw as filtered into the far reaches of my subconscious. We are saturated in media; pinpointing specific influences isn't something I can do consciously, but it's fun and enlightening when viewers do. So you tell me!"
In your bio, you said you discovered the Ramayana while in Trivandrum. How did that happen?
"My first exposure was the Amar Chitra Katha comic book series circulating at Toonz animation studio, where my then-husband was working."
One of the things I really liked about Sita was that, although the inspiration was clearly personal and traumatic, you added enough humour to keep it from becoming a pity party. How difficult was it to keep that balance between laughter and pathos? How did you pull it off?
"The humour isn't 'added,' it's an integral part of my take on things. I was just trying to be honest. Years of cartooning have taught me that the truth is funny enough. I try to avoid "gagging"; any humor in my work comes from my honestly finding life funny. In fact the more painful it is, the more funny it is."
How did you discover Annette Hanshaw's music?
"I heard her voice for the first time while "sofa surfing" after my break-up. I was staying in the home of a record collector in New York. He had original Hanshaw 78's on his shelf, a friend played 'Mean to Me,' and I was hooked."
What was it about her music that so affected you?
"Her voice is so sweet and vulnerable and without bitterness, even as she sings of heartbreak and man-done-her-wrong. Also it comes from a completely different era, separate from both today and ancient India. Those old songs really show how the story of heartbreak in the Ramayana transcends time and culture."
The recordings are surprisingly free of noise for 1920's-era work. Did you have to clean them up, and how did you do it? Why did you keep the "that's all" bit at the end of her songs?
"'That's all' was Annette's trademark, and I think it's a sweet detail in her songs. My sound designer Greg Sextro cleaned up the recordings a bit, but the originals are remarkably clear. Such is the quality of Hanshaw's voice."
What led you to use the 3 styles of animation: the hand-drawn style for Nina's story, the shadow puppets for the discussion of Sita's story, and the Betty Boop-style animation for the musical numbers?
"Having only done short films, and having made each short in a different style, I varied the styles in Sita to keep myself from being bored. I also figured I'd be less bored watching it if the styles varied. It's partly a cheap trick to hold viewer interest.
"The styles emerged pretty organically. I can't tell you how I came up with the style for the musical numbers; it just showed up. The shadow puppets were just a solution to the problem of how to animate to those fabulous voices. The "fake miniature painting" style was obviously based on Indian miniatures, although my skills fall far short of the real thing. The rotoscoped bit just came to me - I knew I wanted to incorporate some rotoscoped dancing, and fire, and passionate music (which Todd Micaelsen brilliantly composed just for the film)."
How much of the shadow puppets' dialogue was set, and how much of it was improvised?
"It was 100% improvised. But my friends were telling a story most of the world knows by heart."
In the movie, you play yourself, especially in that brutal scene where you beg your husband to take you back. Was it difficult to get back into that headspace, where you were? How did you manage to come to terms with who you were at that point, versus who you are now?
"It was a bit unpleasant to do those scenes, because they were about such unhappiness. But I know who I am today is different from who I was yesterday, or 5 years ago. I'm always changing and (hopefully) growing."
(In Part #2 of this interview, Nina Paley talks about the mixed reactions she's received from the Asian community, and how current copyright laws might doom the film)
Dominic von Riedemann - Dominic is the Animated Film Feature Writer, and winner of 11 Suite 101 Editors' Choice Awards.
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