Le Paysagiste/Mindscape a surreal and breathtaking experimental short film, available for viewing thanks to the National Film Board of Canada's Focus on Animation.<br /><br />The NFB Focus on Animation site is wonderful for its educational content as well as its film collection, with a superb series of articles documenting key techniques, films and filmmakers in the history of animation. Le Paysagiste is a perfect representative of what the NFB site has to offer. Created in 1976 using an obscure technique known as pinscreen animation, Le Paysagiste is considered by many the crowning achievement of the rare, but beautiful form. Instead of simply hosting the film, the sites supplementary articles represent some of the best resources for information about both pinscreen animation and the filmmaker.<br /><br />At its essence, pinscreen works through shadow. A screen is poked through with groups of "pins" that can be moved in and out, and then is lit from the side. When sticking out, the pins cast a long shadow, which creates black on the screen. When pushed in, they cause no shadow and create white. Intermediate distances create different lengths of shadow and white, allowing for a whole scale of gray.<br /><br />The results are what you see in Le Paysagiste, a beautiful tapestry that looks like charcoal sketches put in motion. Drouin exploits this impressionistic form in order to create a stream of conscious tour through the mind of an artist. In the film an artist is painting a lovely landscape when he finds himself able to step into the picture. Entering into this foreign world that is in fact his own, he begins a tour of psychological symbolism and random association, as objects and settings twist and morph around him.<br /><br />The fleeting, transitory nature of the images bellies the intense and meticulous work needed to create them. Pinscreen is a very labor-intensive technique, which is a big reason for why it has been virtually abandoned as an art. The NFB's Focus on Animation site though reclaims and highlights historically vital works such as Le Paysagiste, making it a great resource for animation lovers.<br /><br />Read this and other reviews of online short films at ShortoftheWeek.com