THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF ELLIE LEE

I discovered the award-winning films of Ellie Lee because I have an enormous crush on a girl named Judy Budnitz. Miss Budnitz wrote two books I consider to be some of the best I've ever read. And Miss Ellie Lee made a film based on one of Miss Budnitz's stories. Dog Days is Lee's most recent work and her first fiction film. Based on Budnitz's story of the same name, it follows a young girl and her family's struggles to find food in a war-torn town. She is befriended by a strange homeless man who believes he is a dog. He wears a giant dog suit and headpiece, crawls on all fours and barks. It's a film as dark and clever as the story, sacrificing typical rapid-fire flair for a sweet, slow pace. And it won the Grand Jury Award for Best Short Film at the 2000 Hamptons International Film Festival in New York. Why am I telling you all this? Because the reel she sent us was an awesome example of a body of work. The 36-second A Look won the 1994 MTV Free Your Mind competition. It's an animated short about a creepy subway experience where a woman becomes objectified by all the passengers on the train. The line work is soft and delicate, but by scribbling in the color and value of the images, it gives it a creepy, shaky feel. The other film on the reel, the six-and-a-half minute Repitition Compulsion focuses on the physical and sexual abuses homeless women face on the streets and in the shelters. The same uncomfortable shakiness is used again, and is equally effective, especially for a topic as heavy as this one. To catch Dog Days, you'll have to attend a film festival. National cinema chains have yet to embrace her work. Fortunately, it's winning tons of awards, so it may be easier to learn more about it. If not, venture on over to salamanderfilms.com to learn more. You can read about it there, and find out how you can see the rest of her work.