I just saw a great film adaptation of Joe Hill’s ‘Pop Art,’ which is a story I’ve talked about before in my review of Hill’s brilliant collection 20th Century Ghosts. Pop Art is available for free over at the BBC’s website, and it’s only about 15 minutes long — though the broadcast quality of the film is unfortunately pretty bad, worse than the average you tube video, for example.
But the film itself makes up for it. While changed a bit from the original story, the essential surreal charm of the tale of an unhappy boy forging a brief friendship with an inflatable classmate hits with full force. The production is nicely acted, with the central character of Toby capably handled by young actor Bill Milner. Art, his inflatable friend, is an nice piece of SFX puppetry which works very well. The combination of Milner’s acting and the effectiveness of Art ensures the audience has no trouble suspending their disbelief.
A great little gem of a movie from director Amanda Boyle, though lamentably the free web version is of such low resolution that it mars an otherwise satisfying experience.
