Other country's animation

K

KaliW

New member
How come there isn't such a thing as Canadian animation or French animation or UK animation or African animation or Greek animation or Arabian animation or Spanish animation or Italian animation and so on and so forth? There has been animated films from these country's, yet no one calls them by those names.
 
Actually, there is such a thing as animation from all of those nations; it's just that (except possibly for Canada), none of those other countries' cartoons have achieved the cultish fringe following that Japanese animation has in the U.S., and so American pop culture hasn't devised kitschy nicknames for those animation styles as of yet.
 
[QUOTE REMOVED]

Let's see. Recent cartoons from countries other than the U.S. or Japan:

CANADA: "Atomic Betty", "Robot Boy" ( I think ), the new "George of the Jungle", "Captain Flamingo". "Atomic Betty" stands out in my mind as a Canadian cartoon that even has Canadian cultural references: The maple leaf flag in front of the school, the principal's passion for hockey, Betty's use of the word "mum".

FRANCE: "Totally Spies", "Code Lyoko" (?)

ITALY: "W.I.T.C.H.", "Winx Club", "Monster Allergy"
 
Many nations have a much smaller animation output than the United States and Japan, so it is merely the law of averages that there is less of it being exported from their countries of origin to the United States. Many nations' animation is culturally unacceptable in other part of the world (you really don't want to see what they are calling "children's entertainment" in the Muslim world).

Also, in many cases, other nations have lacked a great visionary on the scale of a Disney or a Tezuka to define an entire genre, thus their cartoons are very derivative of American and Japanese fare. Nor has there been any attempt on the part of American fans to create the kind of cross-cultural appreciation that has been directed toward Japanese animation.

Finally, many foreign cartoon have their overseas origins obscured when they are imported to the States, just as Japanese cartoons were during the 1960's. W.I.T.C.H., Winx Club, Totally Spies, Martin Mystery, and Code Lyoko all originated in Europe.
 
[QUOTE REMOVED]

Sure, it couldn't possibly have been because people simply thought it was good.

Anyway, The Weed of Cri hit the nail on the head I'd say.
 
Funnily enough, animation is called 'anime' in both French and Japanese (though the 'e' has an accent in French). I suspect the Japanese word might be a French loan word, but I could be wrong.

And I'd dispute that French animation isn't distinctive. It has one of the oldest animation traditions (as the zoetrope, the praxinoscope and the first ever animated short, 'Phantasmagorie', were created there) and has a large and well-funded national industry. Most of its product is for domestic consumption, and doesn't get seen much for the same reason many French films don't venture outside of France despite having a disproportionately huge film industry...international distributors don't think it's accessible to foreign audiences, unlike crowd-pleasing Japanese fare.
 
The reason possibly for the name "Franime", is because France has a history of Co-producing animation with Japan. There is actually quite a number of projects that France has worked with Japanese studios, whether it be simply outsourcing, or that production was developed between both studios. The ones I can name off the top of my head include Inspector Gadget, Mysterious Cities of Gold, Ulysse 31, Oban Star Racers, (Time Jam) Valerian & Laureline, and Rainbow Brite. There's probably more, but these are the ones I can name off the top of my head.
 
Canada has a HUGE animation output. The problem is that it doesn't get enough respect on American television... well there was a few Canada-France co-production that did (Skyland, all of Marathon's current series, etc). Plenty of which your not even aware are/were Canadian too.
 
I call American animation USAnimation and American cartoons that mimic the Japanese anime style I call USAnime, and Canadian animation I call Canadamation, but you don't have to.
 
Personally, I'd prefer Canime. It rolls off the tongue more easily. I used to refer to European animation done in the anime style (a la Marathon Studios) as faux-anime.
 
Funky Cops is French.

And W.I.T.C.H. is something I'd consider more of a co-production since there were American writers on it.
 
What's wrong with just calling everything "animation" and being done with it? We don't need a half a dozen terms created to make ourselves feel smarter.
 
Because we need differentiation between art forms and such, since most forms of art are called by their country then form of art. I know your stance that stuff shouldn't be labeled because of what country it is from, it just like profiling, but rarely used in animation. Though I don't understand why Anime is the only one to have a special label, along with any other animated cartoon that emulates the style, but nothing original, after all Anime was inspired by the works of Disney, and Anime inspires alot of people.
 
Back
Top