This video serves as an introduction to Yugoslavian animation. I discuss mostly the short films of Zagreb Film, but also TV shows such as Professor Balthazar.
Slight correction, the title and year in the captions at 3:16 are incorrect.
You can watch my beginner’s guide to Soviet animated cinema here:
• A Beginner's Guide to ...
You can watch my beginner’s guide to Hungarian animated cinema here:
• A Beginner's Guide to ...
0:00 Intro
1:58 First Wave
9:44 Second Wave
16:43 Third Wave
19:09 80s/Outro
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If you'd like to support the channel you can donate here: Venmo @Evan-Chester Or www.paypal.me/EvanChester Slight correction, the title and year in the captions at 3:16 are incorrect.
Can you do South Korean animated cinema? Seems like most people only talk about North Korean animated cinema, Pucca or Boondocks, curious if you'd find more :> . p.s. love your videos!!
I still hope you can do a Argentinian animation video. As a suggestion of argentinian animations to check out, I recommend you the film "Anima Buenos Aires" (2012), an antology of four animated shorts from different artists and animators from Argentina (such as Caloi, Carlos Nine, Juan Pablo Zaramella, Pablo Rodriguez Jauregui, etc).
Can you do a guide to the digital animation films?
Very cool
old vietnameese animation ?
As someone from former yugoslavia it's extremely surprising to see so much anti-consumerism, anti-war and pro inviduality messages in yugoslav animation. EX yugo countries today are extremely nationalist, consumerist and conservative
Maybe artists back then weren't conformists.
Better than it would be communist, totalitarist, and non-consummist because there was NOTHING to consumme!
So much of the economy was structured along communitarian and collective lines, it makes sense that anti-war and non-consumerist attitudes would grow out of that.
Why is it surprising? Yugoslavia was a progressive, socialist country proud of its independence and dedication to a peaceful "third way" of existence, eschewing the bellicose propaganda of the superpowers. As for the garbage neoliberal banana countries that rose on its corpse, there's nothing to say... I hope the chauvinist monsters enjoy what they have wrought.
We also had more musicians, painters, architects, everything basically. Now everyone is moving to the west because our economies have failed them. The nationalists want to erase that part of history because they don't want people to remember how good they really had it.
As a fan of Genndy Tartakovsky (creator of Dexter’s lab and Samurai Jack) it’s so cool to discover one of the goldmines of an animation tradition that he drew inspiration from
I didn't know that Genndy was inspired by Yugoslav animation, but watching it I can tell.
same
Check out ex YU new wave and punk if you r into it...
@@tompanoname3579 bull's eye
I met Marušić at an airport in 2018. He remembered me because he was in the film festival jury that had awarded my own animation short in the young creators category. He was very friendly and mentorly, giving me advice I still carry to this day, and schooled me a bit in the history of Zagreb animation, to which I was quite ignorant at the time (and he the leading professor at the university's animation and new media masters programme). I still think about that, and the random chance of us meeting at that airport. The movie he seemed most proud of was Riblje Oko. Apparently he'd also made a feature film, though he promosed to never do it again. Ha.
Wow that’s awesome!
meeting a master of your own field, part of your own country's history in that field and getting a chance at talking with him and sharing wisdom must be like a dream come true for many, really amazing that you had that opportunity
What sort of...aesthetic would you call this?
OMG, Professor Balthazar in the thumbnail! I recognised him instantly after not seeing him for nearly half a century
I grew up watching Professor Baltazar, so it is very interesting to actually find out about the history of the Yugoslavian animation.
Balthazar is still showed on Finnish television today so it's only Yugoslavian animation I know (beside The Elm-enchanted Forest). So it's cool to see other animation from there.
Holy shit, this just unlocked a core memory of me watching episodes of Professor Balthazar on vhs tapes. I had no idea it was from Yugoslavia!
I love how these cartoons gave the UPA style a more cartoonishly abstract look. Something that many cartoons and those PBS Kids bumpers would later have.
Professor Balthazar was well known in the early 1970's here in Italy. State TV showed many episodes on sunday afternoon for the kid's audience.😊
Love how well maintained the KZhead channel for Zagreb Film is. Would love to have explained how it compares it to its other Central and Eastern European contemporaries.
While they don't post much animation as far as I know, Mosfilm has a pretty cool yt channel, they've posted lots of films including some really well known ones with translations. I've watched Stalker, Come and See, Dersu Uzala among others on their channel - all excellent films.
@@mjstecyk Mosfilm is not an animation studio, of course they don't post animation. You should look at Soyuzmultfilm instead. Although I've just checked their channel out and it's all their modern day productions, not the classics.
Balthazar is on tubi at the moment, pls watch before it disappears!
Excellent! I was fairly familiar with Soviet and Czech animators but didn't know much of anything about the Yugoslav industry. I'm hoping to get to Zagreb and then down to Trogir this summer, to explore some family history.
Zagreb is still home to an animation festival held annually... en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animafest_Zagreb
Now we want Czech/Czechoslovakian/ Slovakian animation video, with Jiri Trnka and Jan Svankmajer. And maybe, after that, one about Poland Will be Just good for completing the Eastern Block Animation video series
I would add Romania and Bulgaria as well to round out Eastern Europe's exceptionally rich heritage of animation.
I'm very glad Yugoslavias rich film history is getting some attention! I would love a video on Yugoslav (black) comedies (including the black wave movement) as well. Cheers from Belgrade!
The cartoon "Surrogate" (Ersatz and The Substitute) in 1962 was the first cartoon outside the USA to win an Oscar, and the credit certainly goes to Dušan Vukotić. Yugoslav animation, especially Zagreb Film started from Soviet style to almost a mixture of classic Disney and folk ornamentation from Eastern Europe and I really enjoyed them as a child. Although Baltazar is my favorite Zagreb cartoon, I still liked the movies "The Wonderful Forest" and "The Wizard's Hat" the most, especially "The Wizard's Hat" where you have a fight against the total ice order established by Emperor Mr. Frost (the music of that composition was composed by Kornelije Kovač). It is a great pity that the war followed and that film did not reach the general public and that it was not dubbed into English, but for me that film is the greatest rise of Yugoslav and Croatian animation. After that comes Hlapić (Lapitch) and the decline of Croatian animation (the last one by Croatia Film was Good night Croatia), which can be seen all over the country. As for Serbian animation, I can't think of anything except Serbian Jet Set and Serbian folk tales in two episodes, but there are quality animators and artists there, the problem is finances who couldn't realize their ideas. Certainly, these are only examples of animation in the territory of the former Yugoslavia. Certainly, an excellent critique and explanation related to it.
I totally forgot about Jet Set! That's a fantastic short film, it's basically Serbian South Park.
Technotise: Edit and I (2009)
In the 80's, a studio in Belgrade made a short were Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet was played by monsters. kzhead.info/sun/p72cYZyOaX6cn6M/bejne.htmlsi=j-_siVR_Z8UKlziY
Nikola Majdak (1927-2013) was a pioneering Serbian animator. His charming 1963 short 'Solista' has been uploaded at least of couple of times onto KZhead.
If you're interested in Serbian animation you could (among other things) check out works by Rastko Ćirić, an animator and multimedia artist who founded the animation department at the Belgrade academy of applied arts.
Thank you/ Hvala from Croatia ❤
I watched a lot of Professor Balthazar in my youth. Thank you for sharing this awesome video.
They used to play those on Nickelodeon 40 years ago.
For anyone that wants to read more about Yugoslav animation, I would want to recommend the book 'Propaganda, Ideology, Animation. Twisted Dreams of History' from 2019. It dedicates a whole section to Yugoslavia, with two chapters focusing on the Zagreb School of animation and the lesser-known struggles of Serbian animation respectively. The section on Zagreb was even written by one of the animations mentioned in this video, the Bosnian animator Midhat Ajanović. I'll also take the opportunity to remind everyone that much of this video is focused on shorts. In terms of the lived-in experience of watching animation growing up in Yugoslavia, there was an immensely diverse mix, though this depended on where you were in the country. For the most part however, many kids in former Yugoslavia had the opportunity to grow up with animation icons from both West and East, whether it be the Looney Tunes and Scooby Doo, or Nu Pogodi and Bolek and Lolek.
That's why I say those in the former Yugoslavia had the best of both worlds.
God every single clip you show is just so eye catching, they practically had this style MASTERED by the late 50s
Thank you for sparking my interest for Croatian animation. I myself am Croatian and I knew, sadly, very little about it. The video is fantastic!
Awesome video man! I grew up with Professor Baltazar even tho im 18 years old because it was my grandmas favorite cartoon. Even now when I hear the intro the nostalgia overwhelms me.
Same, takoder odrasla na Cudesnoj Sumi i Craobnjakovom sesiru. Hlapica nisam gledala sve do nedavno though.
Yeah it’s always been popular in Sweden so it’s nostalgic for me too
I'm a Croat, and I fully, absolutely, highly commend your pronunciation of the various Croatian names and sounds (č, ć, ž, š, đ). Of course, "lj" and "nj" aren't quite on, but those are rarely known anyway.. Regardless, Kudos/Svaka Čast 👌👍
They really don't make stuff like this anymore. I am in love with the styles of the shorts from Zagreb film!
I love the visual quality of these animated classics as well. And this was all hand-drawn cel animation, no computer graphics or CGI to use back then. There was an artisanal quality to this work that has been largely lost today, and helps make these little filmic gems so special.
This brings me back, I used to watch Baltazar when I was very little, as a matter of fact, I probably have the CD lying around somewhere...
The stylistic look of the abstraction minimal backgrounds and dramatic animation with pose popping, and cartoon logic have definitely inspired so many cartoons like the pink panther, the ant and the anteater, some of looney toons designs and is quite unique.
A Serb is Here. The Magician's Hat had the most baddas sog Car Mrazomor (the Emperor Frostkiller)
Old slavic animation fascinates me, I'm happy this video exists to inform me more about this. I hope this video gets a lot more views than it currently does as I type, this is a great video and I feel more people should know about this.
I'm 50+ Pole and find it very interesting. I knew almost nothing about Yugoslavian animated films of that era - and they are great. Would love to a video comparison of the all post-soviet animation artists. If you wanna taste Poland's one I would suggest the works of Julian Antonisz.
Along with his animations, Miki Muster is also fondly remembered in Slovenia because of his comics
Its amazing how experimental so many of these films are. Id love a more in depth look at these directors!!
Vatroslav Mimica was also a phenomenal feature film director. Unfortunately, there is too little interest in this cinema abroad, and too few resources in ex-Yugoslav countries for a proper restoration effort.
Reminded Dusan Vukotic even made a live action sci-fi flick... kzhead.info/sun/YJeaqs6we3-Cmmg/bejne.htmlsi=l2tLHhk8N303L5Tj
Thank you very much for this. I appreciate in particular the effort you have taken to pronounce names correctly, this is vanishingly rare, especially as you do a practically perfect job! Just one small correction--Zlatko Bourek's last name is pronounced Bow-rek--both the o and u are sounded separately, and not Boorek (like the cheese pastry).
Thanks for the tip!
Watch out, you might anger a Bosnian for calling burek a cheese pastry
Baltazar went so hard as a kid
I see some DePatie/Freleng Pink Panther in a lot of these... what a fabulous find! Thank you for such a fascinating upload; very inspirational!!
Wow, I was not born back then, didn't know we had such profound animations
I'm glad this channel exists. 😊
It would be great to cover the Romanian animation. Their cartoons about Mouseketeers are very popular in Russia, so I would like to know more about the cartoons of this country.
This is like a Yugoslavian version of Disney's Fantasia❤
Cartoon Network once adopted this art style for almost a decade
After a long time man. I really love your videos. I always look forward to them. Keep going man
Thank you so much for making those animation guide videos, so many of those works are criminally underrated, it's very nice to see someone put so much care in talking about them!
I never thought i would hear Miki Muster's name outside of slovenian media but its really cool that you mentioned him:)
It looks like Dexter's lavatory & power puff were Inspired by this
Dusan Vukotic's Cow on the Moon had characters that felt like they'd fit in Dexter's Lab's world.
Thanks for making this! These look great.
This is amazing, so glad to know this stuff exists, thank you!
Fascinating vid, thank you!
wowww. Omg I need to look up and watch each of these, thank you so much.
I’d love to learn about Czech animation. I’m curious about what they’ve produced outside of Pat & Mat, which I grew up on.
The "Little Mole" films of Zdeněk Miler were my childhood favorites
Krtek is my favorite, grew up on him and other Soyuzmultfilm cartoons@@ChristopherSobieniak
@@ChristopherSobieniak krtek was my childhood 😍
@@fililip298 As a Russian, I can confirm that Krtek is definitely one of the Eastern Bloc classics, popular to this day, and I couldn't be happier about it :D Personally, I'm more a fan of Soviet animation, but it's cool to learn how animation all around the Eastern Bloc, including Yugoslavia, had a lot of variety. Zdravejte, bratja sloveni! :D
Amazing animation and a great video! So a refreshing subject! A great channel on the whole - subscribed! You have many interesting videos to see, great work!
Love the videos, man. Keep it up!!!
This is very interesting. So many of these animated films are more an extension of visual art then film/drama/entertainment.
dude I love these videos on lesser known animation scenes, keep it up!
The most important part of Yugoslav animation is that its popularity and impressiveness among the general public came crashing down in 1978 when RAI started airing Grendizer in Italy. Anyone who could receive Italian TV (aka most of the coast) tossed Baltazar immediately, once they saw giant-ass robots. Once private TV stations started broadcasting in Italy, the floodgates for anime opened. By 1984 RAI quit airing anime, but all that anime was then rerun on private TV stations. And for those who wanted darker themes, there was Tiger Mask and Hokuto no Ken. Needless to say, landlubbers from the mainland were quite jealous over their coastal counterparts with access to Italian TV.
I'm sure those living around Koper, Slovenia had it pretty lucky if they got to see the Italian stations near their town.
To be fair, while Baltazar is a TV show too, anime shows were a completely different market to most of these. Most of these are theatrical shorts meant primarily for festivals (maybe shown before some Zagreb film feature films??), not for television.
One of my favorite Italian animated movies is Allegro non Troppo. It's weird and amazing. The animator also spoofs Disney's Fantasia.
Great video. From Macedonia. Former Yugoslavia. Such a nostalgia😊
Thank you @Kubricklynch for this video ! I grew up in Albania (and partially in Kosovo) and I've seen some of them. However, most post-Yugoslovian war cartoons came from Russia (such as Nu Pogodi). I'd love to see 'A Beginner's Guide to Czhekoslovakian Animation' next time. ❤
Yup I think Czechoslovakia will be next!
Props to you 👏🏻 👏🏻 👏🏻 That was very interesting to watch.
I did not know anything about Yugoslavian animation before this video. It was fascinating and I will definitely look up more.
BALTAZAR!Oh wow I loved that cartoon! Happy new year (from Croatia) to all those who know that East Europe ISN'T just Poland,Ukraine & Russia!
At least Yugoslavia never sided with Stalin and did its own thing.
Croatia si central-western Europe
Ceoatia is (south)Cemtral Europe. Not east.
@@timojarun7830 Well it's on the eastern half of the continent. Not that it matters because the only countries there that the West(tm) can name are Poland,Greece,Russia,& recently Ukraine.
What is or isn't Eastern Europe is a matter of opinion.
This channel is so retrospectively awesome, you deserve a new subscriber from Vantaa, Finland 🇫🇮. 😺👍
Thanx, I have loved seeing this.
Great work!
Holy shit you just brought back my childhood
One of the Yugoslavian animations that I saw when I was a kid in the earlier 2010's was "Cudesna suma". I loved that movie and forgot about it for so many years. Thanks, man, for reminding me of it.
Amazing video!!
This was fantastic. I want to watch all of these, I'll have to come back and get the titles again!
Just catching up on all these videos I missed recently, so well researched and really really amazing man! You should be proud
Thanks a ton!
I love animation but I have a lot to explore. I love that your videos cover new territories of cinema to discover. Keep up the great work!
Thank you!
I remember seeing a bunch of Zagreb films on a PBS show (hosted by Jean Marsh) that came on right after Monty Python back in 77 or 78
Thank you! Very interesting video
Čudesna šuma and Baltazar made my early 90's childhood. Also Znatiželja was really interesting, Inspektor Maska. But Baltazar was pure brilliance. Was showed just before evening news on Croatian National Television
Thank you for this video 👍
Hi I just discovered your channel. It’s exactly what I am was looking for!
I had no idea yugoslavian animation was in a thing before this. Will definitely check out the stuff showed here. Thanks!
thanks! now i want to watch all of them
Finally someone who brings attention to this!!! Glad to see this. You did a great job!
Thanks!
This is amazing
Thanks of this. I'm huge fan of Zagreb and Praga anime schools (legendary A je to and Lolek&Bolek from Praga anime school are out of this world funny, pure joy). Many of their masterpieces shaped my childhood and teenage age. Zagreb school is one of best and most unique anime schools in world, I find it brilliant. Also most "arthouse" imho, in comparison to other influential anime schools in World. I wasn't following it since too many years, but you encouraged me to do so. Thank you, and Happy new Year. P.S. Thanks for mentioning dr. Balthasar, I love this anime endlessly. Just to mention that also Hungarians and Italians back in 70ies- 1990s produced really interesting and magnigicent anime masterpieces worthy of attention. Waiting for part 3.
Great! Greets from Zagreb!
Finnaly. I am glad to see someone covering my countries animation history.
My parents grew up watching Professor Balthazar, and I'm so glad somebody talked about this part of Yugoslav cinema. I also wish more people knew about the amazing movies outside of animation, like the ones by Kusturica, Makavejev, Paskaljević, Šijan, Kovačević...
THANK YOU FOR THIS ! ive recently fallen in love with Baltazar as someone who lives where Yugoslavia used 2 be and the coloring style of the cartoon is taking over my coloring style so all my art is like vibrant and shit and im glad to have gotten to know more about this animation era and have even more inspo now :D
Thanks so much for highlighting Yugoslav animation. After the dissolution of Yugoslavia, like most other things, the animation industry fell apart. The Croatian animators eventually made a Hlapic (knows as Lapitch English), a feature length film based on a old Croatian children's book but all the characters were turned into mice and rats and in general it's a very very quaint (if we're being nice) attempt to make something like a 50s Disney animal movie (it's even a musical). It's also 4:3, baffling for a movie from the 90s. Overall it has a feel of a typical cheap direct to video animated kiddie shlock from Europe except it wasn't outsourced to Korea. Then in 2023 the second Croatian animated film was made (counting after Yugoslavia) called Cricket & Antoinette, this time their first CG film. I haven't had the chance to watch it but it looks really really ugly, it's essentially like some A Bug's Life rip off. In Serbia during the 2000s we got the only two feature length animated films to date and very surprisingly, they are both VERY adult oriented. The first one is Film Noir. Even more surprisingly this film is only available in English and not Serbian, it features prolific American voice actors and takes place in L.A. It is a cel shaded black and white CG film, but while all that sounds super interesting it film is T E R R I B L E. Like it's almost insane that it even exists, the story is barely coherent and filled to the brim with extremely lurid nonsense and features very graphic nudity and gore. The animation looks like the worst possible cel shaded PS2 game. It's so absurd that it is honestly worth a hate watch. The second attempt at a Serbian animated film was a little more admirable and well put together. It's called Technotise: Edit and I. This one was actually in Serbian and takes place in Belgrade in the year 2074. It is essentially an attempt at making an anime, a Serbian version of Akira essentially (Katsuhiro Otomo is even mentioned in the film), with some Ghost In The Shell sprinkled in. This again, sounds very interesting, the animation is mostly 2D, with some CG backgrounds, but most of the actual animation is this extremely uncanny digital 2D puppetry which does not fit at all with the fairly realistic drawing style and it clashes real hard with the bits of actual traditional animation. Also most of the shots are drawn in a completely flat one point perspective so it looks really dull, the editing is quite strange too. The story has potential and some ok elements but the dialogue is extremely cringy with so much unnecessary swearing and awkward lines, though this is most appearent when watching in Serbian, for English speakers, I'd compare it to if an entire movie sounded like 4chan posts or TikTok language.
Technotise: Edit and I was a great movie and I'm glad you mentioned that example, even though it was produced with Japanese animators. Independently, Serbian animation did not succeed as well as Croatian (though unfortunately Croatian also failed badly, especially after Hlapić). Apart from the example you gave, I can only remember Jet Set and Serbian folk tales in two episodes, although there is an animated cartoon about Mihajlo Pupin, the famous Serbian scientist.
@@historiaestmagistravitae.7051 Technotise wasn't produced with Japanese animators, it was made by a very small team of people in Belgrade. Aside from those domestic productions. Serbian studios have worked on a few international productions as outsourcing, most notably on Kingsglaive Final Fantasy XV.
Thank you ❤❤❤
from what you’re telling me it’s as if post yugo the animation industry there has downgraded
Great summary! I wouldn't agree about Technotise though, I think your critique is unnecessarily harsh. Maybe I'm nostalgic since the movie came out when I was just the perfect audience for it (a sci-fi loving nerdy teen), but I did re-watch it a few years ago and I thought it was actually really good? The dialogue is too edgy and a bit cringy at times, I'll give you that, and they sure did cut corners in the in-between frames department, but the overal aesthetics are really good (Aleksa Gajić is an excellent illustrator) - I definitely wouldn't call it 'extremely uncanny.' It's a solid film, and I think it deserves the 7.4 on IMDB and 77% on Rotten Tomatoes. :)
Amazin video, thank you so much! I'd like to make a revew also of the Bulgarian animation
Beautiful
Beautifuly done
Omg it’s Worker and Parasite! Apparently it’s called Vau-Vau I didn’t know that was real
What an exciting, broad introduction to this rich heritage of animation! Many names and titles here were new to me, and I appreciated how you made mention also of animation produced in centers other than Zagreb. Animation and shorts unfortunately tend to be overlooked in film histories, but focusing on these forms makes clear that Yugoslavia was one of the most vibrant and creative crucibles of cinema in the second half of the twentieth century. Indeed, I think the only other country that rivaled it in the arena of animated shorts during that period was Canada, and in both instances strong state investment in the art coupled with considerable creative license for the artists was foundational for these successes. While Yugoslav production was exemplary in so many ways, Eastern European animation in general constitutes a wonderful cultural heritage, and I would welcome further explorations in those national cinemas I don't believe have yet received their own episodes here, such as Poland, the former Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria.
Very good...!!!! Thank you for summoning this...!!!!
Wow, coming from Latvia it's amazing to see how interesting and creative Yugoslavian animation was, honestly I've always kind of hated old latvian animations 😅 Both in style and content. These are really cool.
Man I Remember Watching Most Of These As A Kid. Thanks For Discussing About Yugoslavian Animation.
Which network did the cartoons aired?
Wow, I was born in 1995 in a latin country. I don’t think we had many of these. My mom did know about Mr Magoo. But I can see that these characters with big noses and small bodies influenced many cartoons, like the Pink Panther. And also the backgrounds are very similar to Rocky and Bullwinkle.
Thanks, this has been a quiet intresting video! I've been curious the last 5 years or so of what none American cartoons were like. I wish it was easier to find.
American cartoons have gotten worse. It's why we like to see how our neighbors do now.
Thank you, recommended.
Thanks, cool stuff
In Australia we had Balthazar on television in the 1970's and perhaps some of the shorts mentioned as interludes in programming. Thanks.
great stuff
Great video
Yugoslavian animated film directors in the 60´s were really like "So I was thinking of this movie which would be an allegory for war and about how oppressive our modern society is"
Being next door to the Soviet Bloc probably gave them reason to make these statements.
Side note: your pronunciation of Yugoslavian names is amazing