Second Take

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A still from one of Andy Smetanka’s animated sections in My Winnipeg (PROVIDED GRAPHIC)

Had Missouri animator Andy Smetanka not made a pilgrimage to Winnipeg, he’d have never acquired such an agreeable title.
   
"I love that!" he says, when it’s mentioned that Cinematheque’s website calls him ‘The Missoula Sorcerer.’
   
"You can’t give yourself a nickname like that."
   
Smetanka drove to Winnipeg in 2001 to meet his filmmaking idol, Guy Maddin, after falling in love with the director’s 1992 feature, Careful. Flushed with inspiration, the then 30 year old — who’d never previously entertained filmmaking aspirations —returned home to hone his own unique magic.
   
The circle closed years later when Maddin tapped Smetanka’s talents for his much-acclaimed 2007 film, My Winnipeg, in which Smetanka recreated episodes from the city’s history.
   
Now Smetanka has returned to his city of inspiration to introduce a program of his own work — as well as My Winnipeg — at Cinematheque, in addition to conducting an animation master class this weekend.
   
If the now 41-year-old animator is truly a wizard, he keeps mostly to his tower: most of his animated shorts, he says, have "travelled only as far as YouTube," on account of his antipathy for paperwork and the drudgery of distribution.
   
"I’m more word of mouth, and I don’t really even do much mouth," he says.
   
Yet Smetanka’s short works are so alternately beautiful, mysterious and even epic that experiencing them is akin to discovering buried treasure.
   
With the exception of the scratch-animated Every Other Word, the program screening tomorrow emphasizes Smetanka’s distinctive use of animated silhouettes.
   
"What I do is make figures and landscapes from black card stock, and use stop motion to make them move," he explains. His backgrounds are either tissue paper or vellum.
   
"You can make a film using papier mâché and blankets," Smetanka says. "You can create entire worlds using low-tech, low-cost means, as long as you put in the hard work.
   
"That’s the lesson I learned from Guy Maddin."
   
Perhaps no single title encapsulates this better than Smetanka’s 2006 short Le Force: Le Wizard, which features a band of heroes braving towering mountains and legions of monsters to vanquish an evil wizard.
   
"It’s a collection of my preoccupation with fantasy and sci-fi," says Smetanka, a professed fan of stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen, whose famous skeleton army from Jason and the Argonauts is echoed in the film.
   
"I’m also addicted to Super 8," Smetanka continues. "It allows me to exercise a lot of control. Besides, it’s inexpensive, and I’m poor as a church mouse."
   
While Smetanka should feel at home in a city "chock-full of great animators" — such as another of his admired filmmakers, Mike Maryniuk (2008’s Cattle Call) — he humbly admits to feeling a little intimidated.
   
"I hope I don’t feel like an impostor," he confides.
   
Anyone who takes in Smetanka’s magic picture show, however, will feel the genuineness of its spell.
   
Andy Smetanka will introduce a program of his shorts tomorrow night, Feb. 17, at 7 p.m. and the feature My Winnipeg on Sat., Feb. 18, at 7 p.m. at Cinematheque.