A superhero who speaks only the language of dance makes an outrageous, graceful and rambunctious physical acceptance speech.
Watch Rubberman on YouTube (scroll down):
Awards and Reviews
Rubberman won the 2001 AFTRS Critic’s Circle Award for Best Production Design for Kate E. Wills. It was shortlisted for Best Dance Film at the 2001 Australian Dance Awards, the 2001 AFTRS SMPTE Creative Technology Award for Digital Effects for Andy Canny. and Best Short Film at Shepparton Shorts Short Film Festival in Victoria. It featured in Dance, Camera, Action2, Dennis Alexander’s trailer for the 3rd Constellation Change Screen Dance Festival in London, which won the DPA Award in Germany for Best Editing in a promotional trailer.
Rubberman has been described in glowing terms in Independent Filmmaker magazine by Christopher Strickland.
“ Karen Pearlman (writer/director) and Richard Allen (writer/choreographer/performer) deliver this quirky and energetic short on the trails of Rubberman – an indomitable superhero in black rubber suit and a helmet of styled pink rubber hair.
“ Rubberman’s Nobel prize acceptance speech (a voiced-over translation of his native language of dance) riffs on the enduring power of flexibility and the ability to bounce back. He reveals that only under attack from alien forces has he realised his chameleonic nature as liquid and solid, finally thanking his enemies for forcing him beyond the limits he had imagined for himself.
“Part poetic manifesto, part movement piece, Rubberman also does karate in comic strip colours, KAPOW! style text harking back to the days of cheesy Batman stoushes. Warped screen effects and lightning zooms show that the Physical TV Company is easing with maturity into film, doing much more with it than merely recording performance. They also seem to be the only bunch attempting this sort of thing in Australia, and doing it well.”
Key Credits
Director: Karen Pearlman Writers: Karen Pearlman and Richard James Allen Choreographer: Richard James Allen Cinematographer: Tim Spicer Production Designer: Kate E. Wills Costume Designer: Justine Seymour Editor/Digital Effects: Andy Canny Sound Designer/Composer: Serge Stanley
And appearing as Rubberman: Richard James Allen
A Physical TV Company Production in association with the Australian Film, Television and Radio School.
Rubberman screened as part of Move the Frame, a program for cable access television produced by Anna Brady Nuse/Straight to the Helicopter, in the USA in 2006.
Festivals Screenings
Rubberman made his first film festival outing at IMZ dance screen in Monte Carlo, and has been bouncing around the globe ever since:
• Artsfest Filmfestival, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, • Australian Poetry Festival in Sydney, • Australian Film Television and Radio School’s National Screening Tour, • Constellation Change Screen Dance Festival, London, • Dance Briefs, Omeo Dance Studio, Sydney, • Dance for the Camera Festival at the University of Utah, • Festival Internacional de Video Danza de Buenos Aires, • Festival Internacional de Video Danza del Uruguay, • Mill Valley Film Festival in California, • Mostra de Video Dansa in Barcelona, • Moving Pictures Festival of Dance on Film and Video, Toronto, Canada • Moving Pictures Festival of Dance on Film and Video touring program Reel Dance on the Road, Peterborough, Canada • Napolidanza, Festival di Videodanza/Il Coreografo Elettronico, in Italy • Popcorn Taxi at the Valhalla Cinema in Sydney, • Short Trips @ The Melbourne Fringe 2002 Best Film Award • Somerset Celebration of Literature in Queensland, • South East Dance’s Dance 4 Camera programme at the Brighton Film Festival, Guildford and Canterbury in Britain, • Shepparton Shorts Short Film Festival in Victoria, • VideoDance at the International Thessaloniki Film Festival, Athens, • Wollombi Short Film Festival in the Hunter Valley, NSW • Art on the Rocks Film Festival, Sydney, • Danscamdanse, Gent, Belgium, • Performing Arts in the Screen Exhibition, Arts Wonderland - Festival in the Square, Taipei Arts International Association (as part of a two day retrospective), .• Dance Camera Istanbul, Turkey, as part of a retrospective screening of ten films entitled A Dance Television: Physical TV, .• Xontakt, Split, Croatia .• Austhetic, Federation Square, Melbourne.
Distributors
Theatrical Distributors: The Physical TV Company
and The Australian Film, Television and Radio School
Non-Theatrical Distributor Australia and New Zealand: Marcom Projects as part of 3 Physical Digital Videos.
Technical Details – Screening Copy
FILM OPTION Screening Medium: 35mm film Duration: 6 minutes Number of Reels: 1 Aspect Ratio: 1: 1.69 Speed: 24 frames per second Sound: Dolby SR Value of the exhibition copy: $500
VIDEO TAPE OPTION Screening Medium: Betacam SP tape (PAL or NTSC available) Duration: 6 minutes Number of Cassettes: 1 Aspect Ratio: 4 x 3 letterboxed or 16 x 9 anamorphic Speed: 25 frames per second Sound: Dolby Surround Value of the exhibition copy: $100
“ Karen Pearlman (writer/director) and Richard Allen (writer/choreographer/performer) deliver this quirky and energetic short on the trails of Rubberman – an indomitable superhero in black rubber suit and a helmet of styled pink rubber hair.
And appearing as Rubberman: Richard James Allen
Theatrical Distributors: 