Movies - Ralph Bakshi

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	Movies - Ralph Bakshi

Ralph Bakshi (October 1938) is a director of animated and occasionally live-action films. As the American animation industry fell into decline during the 1960s and 1970s, Bakshi tried to bring change to the industry by creating and directing a number of animated feature films that were aimed at adults instead of children.

Ralph Bakshi's films have created controversy while continuously breaking new ground in his art form. He encouraged the public to look at animation in a new way by creating worlds that are sometimes familiar and sometimes alien, whose power and strangeness are completely absorbing. He pioneered animation with adult themes using political commentary and satire.

Life and career

Early days

Ralph Bakshi was born of Krymchak descent on October 29, 1938, in Haifa, then part of the British Mandate of Palestine. In 1939 his family came to New York to escape World War II. He grew up in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn. As a child, Bakshi loved comic books and art in general. Bakshi was a boxer during his teen years. Bakshi first attended the Thomas Jefferson High School , and was transferred to the High School of Industrial Arts and graduated with an award in cartooning in 1957. Bakshi made a name for himself in animation during the fading days of theatrical studio cartoons. At the Terrytoons studio (best known for the Mighty Mouse
cartoons), he started as a cel polisher then graduated to cel painting.

Practicing nights and weekends, he quickly became an inker and then an animator, working on characters such as Mighty Mouse
, Heckle and Jeckle
, Deputy Dawg
, Foofle & Lariat Sam. By 25 he was directing these shows as well as Sad Cat, James Hound and others. At 28 he created and directed a series of superhero spoof cartoons called The Mighty Heroes. Bakshi was introduced to the work of J.R.R. Tolkien by a director at Terrytoons in 1956. In 1957, he started trying to convince people that the Lord of the Rings
books could be animated and tried to obtain the rights , finally succeeding the mid-70s.

In 1967, Bakshi moved to Paramount Studios, where he was placed in charge of this famous cartoon studio during what were to be its final days. Here he hired Mort Drucker, Wally Wood, Jack Davis, Joe Kubert, Jim Steranko, Gray Morrow and Roy Krenkel, and produced several experimental animated short cartoons, though none of them had a major impact with audiences. Paramount closed its cartoon studio for good in 1967. In 1968, Bakshi founded his own studio, Ralph's Spot, and headed a low-budget but distinctive animated series for television based on the Spider-Man comic book; new episodes appeared until 1970. After 1970, Bakshi left the world of television and went into full-length animated feature films.

Fritz the Cat, Heavy Traffic and Coonskin

In 1971, Steve Krantz tagged on as a producer on what was to be Bakshi's first feature film. Bakshi had written several original scripts that would later become Heavy Traffic, Wizards, and Cool and the Crazy, but Krantz suggested that Bakshi first develop a film adapted from someone else's work. They mulled over various projects, finally deciding on Robert Crumb's successful underground comic book Fritz the Cat.

Bakshi and Krantz flew out to Oakland to find Crumb and secure the rights. Dana Crumb was only too happy to join them in the venture. Crumb saw the film as a perfect opportunity to immortalize his name in film, and agreed to give Bakshi and Krantz the film rights to the character.

In April of 1972 Fritz the Cat opened in LA and New York to rave reviews and was a box office smash, taking in $90 million worldwide. It was the first animated feature film to receive an X rating in the United States, and it was unquestionably aimed primarily at adult audiences—something that had previously been unheard of. Creator Robert Crumb, however, hated the film, and eventually wound up killing off the title character in retaliation.

The financial success of Fritz the Cat gave Bakshi the opportunity to produce two more adult-oriented feature films, Heavy Traffic
and Coonskin
, which revealed Bakshi's interest in black history in America, another subject largely overlooked by Hollywood movie studios. Coonskin was sold to Al Ruddy during a screening of The Godfather
by Bakshi who told Ruddy that he wanted to make an adaptation of the storybook "Uncle Remus." Bakshi Productions was opened and they began pre-production.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Ralph Bakshi ]

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Movies - Ralph Bakshi

Life and career

Early days

Fritz the Cat, Heavy Traffic and Coonskin

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