Issue link: https://viewer.e-digitaleditions.com/i/122153
artspace A tail of significance Writer Erica Harrison and director Simon Rippingale speak with Mitch Brook about their new short film, A Cautionary Tail. "Right where her back joined with her bum, they spied something that sent them numb: a small protuberance or lump projecting from their daughter's rump." So starts the story of a girl who is a little different. A tail sprouts from her backside, differentiating her from all other children, and it comes to define her. It's something that makes her different, just as there is something different about each of us. When she was young, everyone celebrated the girl's tail. It showed her emotions and "spoke well before she could, as every good appendage should". Her parents found joy in their daughter's difference, and the girl loved the attention from her classmates when she used her tail in games of make-believe. When the girl gets a bit older, though, her friends question her and reject her for being different and "weird". So she must conceal what makes her unique and eventually has the tail removed. She is stricken without it and must deal with losing an intrinsic part of herself. "The story comes from a feeling that I think everyone experiences at some stage in their life: that of not fitting in and of being different or alone for some reason," says Erica Harrison, the storyteller behind the animated short film A Cautionary Tail. "Everyone has had their own 'tail' that they've struggled to accept. "We live in a society where it's all about expectations. Some of those are good, giving us guidelines for our ethics and culture, but we need to question others. It's important to think and decide for yourself what's important, what's ethical and what's the best decision in any XVIII situation. I think everyone struggles with that every single day." The story focuses on the process of dealing with loss, especially of something that you think defines you. It could be a relationship, an item or an activity. For Erica, it was running. "I used to be a runner. I'd run every day and it made me feel fabulous," she says. "But I was hit by a car about four years ago and one of my legs was badly shattered. I didn't know if I would recover and I felt a great sense of loss for the thing that brought me joy." Erica wrote the story, which is all in rhyming couplets, while she was recovering from the accident. It's a darkly humorous tale that enabled her to focus on something good while she was healing and take her mind off her condition. "The poem that Erica wrote was so beautiful and fully formed as an amazing story about growing up, letting go and figuring out how to be who you are," says Simon Rippingale, a good friend of Erica and the director of A Cautionary Tail. "It immediately set little animation bells ringing in my head." The filmmakers used two primary creative elements. The sets are handmade miniatures and the digitally animated characters were superimposed onto those backgrounds. The detail in the miniatures made by a team headed by art director Simon Bethune is astounding and incredibly realistic, and the digital characters, animated by a team led by Paul Perrott, are lovable and believable. The soundtrack to the short film is by Michael Yezerski and takes the viewer through the various moods of this enlightening story. Opposite page: Scenes from A Cautionary Tail, an animated short film directed by Simon Rippingale, and written by Erica Harrison.