When you’re a kid, friendships mean everything. While family provides a foundation of belonging, friends are your first chosen companions with the power to reflect your best and worst qualities back at you. In the world you create together, nothing else exists but your jokes, games, and secret hiding spots. That is, until puberty rears its ugly head. Today’s Staff Pick Premiere, “Bloeistraat 11” is about the unpredictable moment that ushers a kid from childhood to adulthood, causing an intimate friendship to shift in a new direction for the first time.
Winner of the prestigious Le Cristal d’Annecy at Annecy International Animation Festival, director Nienke Deutz’s poignant animation was a darling at animation festivals around the world. Focusing on two inseparable young girls whose experiences of joy, pain, and play solely exist within their close friendship, the film (whose meaningful title translates to “Flowering Street”) uses a fascinating animation technique to portray relatable themes of human discovery and growth.
Ahead of its exclusive Premiere on Vimeo, we were so excited to talk with Nienke about her unique filmmaking process. Read on for excerpts from our conversation.
On inspiration:
I was interested in portraying the dynamics of an intimate friendship. Sometime early in my research, I decided this would be a friendship between two girls at the onset of puberty. I wanted to explore how I could make animated characters palpable and at the same time show the animation technique and materials. Finding the right balance between those elements was a challenge because in order to engage with characters and their story, you want to forget about the technique.
On technique:
The characters are first drawn by hand (12 drawings for each second), printed on plastic sheets, and then cut out. The clothing was then painted on each individual frame. Finally, the characters were placed in physical sets and photographed one after another to recreate the animation.
On matching style with story:
I wanted to create a universe that makes sense for its characters, which are kids entering puberty. So I decided to use crafting materials that aren’t too fancy like cardboard, plastic, acrylic paint, and markers. I wanted the house to look like one that you would dream of building as a kid.
Next to that, I think it is interesting to show the work that goes into making an animated movie. I just love animation and I wanted to draw attention to the materials and the animation itself. For instance, there is a moment on the couch where one of the girls takes off her pants, and the paint changes into fabric. The material changes in front of the audience’s eyes, which gives them a moment to think about the construction of the film.
On the significance of sound design:
The house played a big role when I was making decisions around sound design because it functions as a symbol of their friendship. For the girls, there is nothing outside of their friendship so there is nothing outside of the house. To emphasize this bubble, I wanted no sounds that came from outside of the house or garden.
In the beginning, I didn’t even want a score. I just wanted to use music that was audible for the characters. In time, I got a bit less extreme about that and realized a subtle score could help to set the right mood, as long as it was not too sweet. The composer I worked with understood my ideas and I think he translated them beautifully into the score. A nice detail: the voices on the song are his kids singing in made up English – I love that.
On challenges:
There were many challenges, but the one that stands out most was working with the transparent cut-out characters. In the beginning, I had to convince my producer that it was really worth it to work with this labour intensive animation technique. You basically animate everything twice, first in 2D and then again as replacement stop motion. But to me, using this technique was essential to the film. I had done a lot of tests on my own in my studio, and I was excited to use it on a larger scale.
No one on my team had worked with characters of this material before. There are a lot of nice things you get from it: reflections, shadows and you can play with, and the transparency. However, it is also difficult material to work with. If you change the angle of the character a tiny bit, its whole shadow can disappear or deform completely. Getting the light right was one of the big challenges. Fortunately, I was able to work with a very skilled and passionate gaffer and DP who always came up with solutions if there was a problem. It was the first time I worked with a team, and it was an amazing experience.
Her advice to aspiring filmmakers:
Immerse yourself. Take the time to experiment and develop your own voice. Spend time getting your base clear. If you know what is important to you when making a movie, you can always go back to that base and check whether you are making decisions for the right reasons.
On what’s next:
I’m working on a new short in almost the same technique as “Bloeistraat 11.” It depicts a 40-year-old woman who goes on vacation to an all-inclusive resort alone. I’m also developing an animated documentary based on my neighbors, superpowers, and the desire to fly. For this documentary, I’m using a completely different animation technique that I’m really enjoying researching.
