FernGullyThe Last Rainforest

Overview

Report Compiled By: Rachel Dailey, Nicole Epperly, and Charlie Berry

Rachel: Introduction, Video Clip, Characters, Slideshow

Nicole: Theme, Storyline, Overview, and Discussion Questions

Charlie: Historical and Cultural Aspects, Animation and Style

IntroductionCrysta, a young fairy, hasn’t ventured beyond the world of

FernGully. Living in the rainforest, Crysta was lead to believe that humans no longer existed. It was legend that humans

were driven away by the evil Hexxus, the spirit of destruction and toxic to all nature. While exploring, Crysta

finds dead trees marked to be cut down and throughout the film, Crysta’s goal is to save the trees and preserve

rainforest from the evil Hexxus.

Originally the stories were written by Diana Young. When turned into a film, the screen play was written by Jim Cox. Director of the film was Bill Kroyer. Stars Featured in the Film include:• Samantha Mathis• Christian Slater• Robin Williams

Technical Film and Animations

• Film was made in April 1992• It was made using Computer Animation• The use of the computer animation reduced production time• Traditional animation would have taken longer

FernGully: A Land of Beauty

In this film, the characters struggle to overcome the worst possible thing that could come to their land: industrialization.

Along with industrialization comes pollution and a dreadful slimy antagonist.

Industrialization and pollution seemingly go hand in hand, as this film outlines for us.

CharactersCrysta

Crysta is a mischievous young fairy driven by curiosity. She often finds herself in trouble while trying to protect the forest. Her character represents hope and brings light to all things dark.

Zak

A young human boy finds himself working for a logging company and then he meets Crysta and his perception changes. Rather than being part of problem, he decides to be part of the solution. He symbolizes that it is never too late to change.

CharactersBatty Koda

A bat that quickly befriends Crysta in the film. His character provides comic relief throughout the film. His sense of humor picks on the humans and shows how bizarre humans can be.

Hexxus

The main villain and antagonist of the film. He is the spirit of pollution and destruction. He feeds off of pollution such as slime, sludge, and smoke. His goal is to wipe out FernGully.

Storyline

Fern Gully is a rainforest. Full of life and diversity, the fairies help aid growth and prosperity.

Storyline

All is well in Fern Gully, but in the distance a tree leveler is hard at work collecting lumber.

Our friend Zak is hard at work marking trees to be cut down.

Storyline

Little does he know that the mysterious tree he is about to mark is actually the prison of a terrible creature: Hexxus.

Consuming pollution to strive and grow, Hexxus was a nemesis to Fern Gully in the past and was condemned to his arboreal prison by the magical leader Magi.

Storyline

Through magical accident by main character Crysta, Zak is turned to “fairy size” and learns all about the fairy lifestyle.

Because Zak marked the tree containing Hexxus to be cut down, the leveler heads that way to do the job.

In an attempt to cut down the tree, Hexxus is inadvertently released from his prison and begins to consume the bouts of pollution coming from the leveler.

Storyline

In his time spent with the fairies, Zak realizes that the way he was promoting deforestation was wrong.

Learning of the new rise of Hexxus, the fairies then have to act quickly to stop him in his tracks.

Crysta is learning magic from Magi and is sent forth to do the task.

Storyline

Thankfully fairy magic prevails and is able to stop the nemesis in his tracks.

Hexxus is again condemned to a tree prison and they all live in peace and harmony once again.

Video Clips

Movie Trailer

http://youtu.be/wf9BH-zB2Ng

The Entire Film

http://www.veoh.com/watch/v32996472nxNEb74r

Themes Industrialization and pollution is a very

real thing. It is known widely now that humans virtually destroy environment in ways.

There are many themes in this film, however one of the most prominent ones is: Treat your world how you would want to be treated.

Themes In the film, Zak carves with his knife into a tree.

Crysta, being a fairy, is very upset and questions why he would do such a thing. She asks him: “Can’t you feel it’s pain?” and places his hand over the wound on the tree.

If we treated the world like Crysta would, the natural environment would thrive like it did before the time of industrialization.

Cultural & Historical Aspects

The movie started as a book by Diana Young. The book was published by Scholastic in the United States

Cultural & Historical Aspects

Although the film includes fairies and magical creatures, it still has historical and cultural context within the story.

The story of Fern Gully is set in Australia around the area of mountains with many legends and tales that the native people believe in. The book and movie are located in the forests surround Mount Warning, which the Aboriginal people believe to be sacred land. The Aboriginal people are very in tune with their land and identify with the characteristics of the surrounding animals, plants, terrain, and food sources. The Aboriginal people believe in a balance of nature and humans, they also believe that Spirits help maintain that balance and help relieve some of the human impact in the environment.

Early Settlers of Mount Warning destroyed the wildlife and animal habitat of the surrounding areas.

The government eventually noticed the damage taking place and declared Mount Warning a national park.

Cultural & Historical Aspects

To think critically about the film Ferngully, we connected the film Princess Mononoke using the interpretive method to contrast the examples of preserving the natural environment.

Princess Mononoke is set in Japan's late Muromachi Period (1336-1573); the film focuses on the struggle between the forest kami and the humans who abuse the forest's natural resources.

Cultural & Historical Aspects

Events unfold through the vantage of Ashitaka, an Emishi prince and outsider to this world. Mono no ke means spirit or supernatural thing—something unspecifiable and therefore extraordinary, strange, to be feared; just like someone who can be destroying natural resources.

In Ferngully, the story is set in the rain forest, Ferngully. The film focuses on the Crysta, the fairy, and how she tries to show humans that the forest is full of value and that they shouldn’t demolish it. Each film compares and contrasts the negatives of humans taking advantage of natural resources.

Style and Animation

The animation of Fern Gully: The Last Rainforest is not strikingly different than other animations of the time and even animations prior to the production.

However, the creators of this film used some techniques other than the typical techniques for the time, some of the simpler parts of the animation started with ink and paint. The animation at times was printed and painted to get the fully ending effect

A heavy reliance on computers was present during the creation of this film. This was true for overall character creation, movement animation (fairies flying, Batty flying) as well as general movement.

Animation

Style and Animation

The animators used a large amount of flying FX. There are two types of flying FX that the animators used to produce the best animation, Standard flying FX are from the waist down when the characters are moving at a regular rate of speed and acting while doing so, Glowball zooming, for example, when Crysta is flying much faster than the background and not acting. In the glowball zooming the FX cover the character’s entire body.

The flying FX consist of two elements the trail, and the glowball sparkles (friendlies)

The trail follow the fairies wherever they fly, and the “pixie dust” and sparkles that follow and magnetically cling to the fairy in flight.

We Can Learn From This Film…

In this day and age, it is easy to forget what is outside of our own “bubbles”. Crysta fights for what she believes in and never gives up on her morals. Although you might not be able to “save Fern Gully” so to speak, you can make a difference by simply recycling water bottles instead of throwing them in the garbage. Nature is a delicate thing and ultimately it will treat us how we treat it.