The Dam Keeper


The Dam Keeper is a 2014 American animated short film directed by Robert Kondo and Daisuke Tsutsumi. It tells the story of Pig, an introverted youth who lives in a windmill and keeps a dark fog from engulfing his town. Although socially rejected by his peers, he is befriended by the artistic Fox.
Kondo and Tsutsumi began developing the film while working as art directors on Monsters University and produced it through a co-op program at Pixar. This is Tsutsumi's second short film, after 2011's Sketchtravel, and Kondo's first directorial effort. Producers Megan Bartel and Duncan Ramsay were also employees at Pixar. The film received an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Short Film.

Plot

Pig lives alone in a windmill on the outskirts of town. The windmill sits atop a massive wall and continually blows away a dark fog that perpetually looms outside the wall. Every day, Pig winds the windmill to keep it turning, just like his father before him.
However, in town and at school, nobody likes Pig. Even though he protects the town, the other animal children make fun of him and bully him.
Soon, a new student, Fox, arrives at the school carrying a sketchbook and quickly becomes rather popular. One day, she mistakenly drops the sketchbook while leaving the classroom, and Pig discovers that Fox draws mocking caricatures of classmates and teachers. Fox shows up the next day upset about losing the sketchbook, but she is quickly relieved to see that Pig has it with him.
That day at school, bullies drag Pig into the restroom and harass him. Fox discovers Pig in the restroom, and consoles him and teaches him to use art as an emotional outlet for his daily hardships. The two become good friends. After school one day, Pig notices Fox surrounded by several other students looking at one of her drawings and laughing. Emboldened, Pig approaches the group. Through the crowd, Pig barely sees a mean-looking caricature of himself, with "Dirty P-" written at the top. Devastated, Pig rips the drawing out of Fox's sketchbook and runs away in tears.
As evening continues, the fog draws near - Pig should be returning to his home to wind the windmill. Instead, sitting in sorrow, he puts on his gas mask and waits as the fog envelops the town while the other animals flee in terror. Eventually, Pig looks down at the drawing and discovers that he is not the only one caricatured—Fox is next to him, and the title is actually "Dirty Pals". Jolted back to his senses, Pig realizes what horrible risk the town is in. He makes his way to the windmill and manages to rid the town of the fog, losing and damaging one of the mill's propellers in the process.
Pig gazes out the window of the windmill as the fog clears and the citizens begin cleaning up. Pig remembers the drawing and begins to leave. Upon opening the door, Fox is waiting for him. Pig acknowledges his misunderstanding, and she extends forgiveness to him. The two then play together inside the windmill.

Cast

Development

The Dam Keeper was produced as part of a co-op program at Pixar, under which employees are allowed to develop their own films without the use of studio resources. Directors Robert Kondo and Daisuke "Dice" Tsutsumi were both art directors at Pixar. They had worked together on Toy Story 3 and Monsters University. Partially facilitated by having their offices located next to one another's, a friendship quickly formed between the two of them. While Kondo's first job was at Pixar, Tsutsumi had previously been employed at Blue Sky Studios and is married to a niece of famed Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki. Kondo recalls having been "fascinated by outside experience" and recognized at the time that his co-worker's "vision always seemed to be greater than the box our responsibility." In 2011, Tsutsumi released his first directorial effort - an animated short film called Sketchtravel. He was aided on the film by Kondo, who worked on it as an animator. Kondo has described the film as having "very limited animation...like a children's book come to life."
Shortly after the completion of Sketchtravel, Tsutsumi turned to Kondo with the idea of collaborating on a new short film. This was during the "heat of production" for Monsters University, a time after which, as Kondo explained, most animators normally consider taking time off. Kondo noted, "Dice wanted to take time off, but in that time, he wanted to make a film." The two were tantalized by the potential, recognizing how much Tsutsumi had been able to achieve as a solo-director, and considering how much more they would be able to achieve together. For the following year, they developed story ideas before and after work, sharing treatments with each other through Google Docs. Unable to use their Pixar offices for the task, they wrote in their home studios, cafes - anywhere that "encouraged creativity" and had internet access. They then got together on weekends to discuss story ideas.

Pre-production

Once their duties on Monsters University were complete, Kondo and Tsutsumi took a three-month sabbatical to begin production on their project. They began without any clear intentions - the film would simply be an experiment to see "how far could go". The two co-directors rented a windowless studio right across the street from Pixar. At first, they were unsure of how to approach production. "There was no real formula or no real path as to what was right", Kondo said. "We didn't know - should we be writing a script, should we be drawing moments, should we be talking about character design?" Not until their editor, Bradley Furnish, became involved, did all of the individual elements synthesize into what the directors recognized as a potential film.
The two directors refused to pressure themselves into striving for perfection; they just wanted to get the film done. Recognizing the process as a "learning experience", and choosing to extend this opportunity to the rest of the crew, they hired animators who were predominantly young and had just graduated from school. "Growth was a big part of...who we selected to bring on", Kondo said. "We kept asking, what can you gain by working on this project?" Rounding out the crew were fellow Pixar employees, such as Duncan Ramsay, who worked as a production assistant at the studio. Ramsay's co-workers gave him the chance to come onto The Dam Keeper in an even more distinguished position than production assistant - producer. However, Ramsay feared that balancing a project like this, on the side of his regular Pixar duties, would prove an unmanageable workload. So initially, he turned the offer down. All the same, he found himself gradually being drawn into the project, and once he committed full-scale, he convinced his friend, Megan Bartel, to come onto the film as a producer with him. Bartel characterized Ramsay as "the perfect strategist"; someone who holds an ideal mixture of warmth and intelligence. Ramsay would hold "daily progress check-ins" throughout the film's production and found a "creative outlet" in writing the film's narration. The crew in its entirety consisted of about seventy people, though there was a "core group" of about twenty to twenty-five. Everyone worked on a volunteer basis.
For guidance, Kondo and Tsutsumi turned to Erick Oh, one of their Pixar co-workers, who already held experience as an independent filmmaker. Oh was happy to oblige. As he grew more involved with the film, he moved beyond his mere advisory role to become the film's supervising animator. Although he had never worked in this position before, he found it to be like a "bridge" between animating and directing.
Official production began in early 2013. Although Kondo and Tsutsumi had planned to carry out most of the film's production within the three months that they took off from Pixar, this schedule was developed around an early version of the film that only ran for eight minutes. As the film's length expanded, eventually reaching eighteen minutes, the production period stretched into a total of nine months. "We just couldn't foresee the length of the story we wanted to tell in the beginning", Tsutsumi reflected. " if you look at the math, three months of eight minutes to nine months of 18 minutes is not too bad." Commenting on the film's burgeoning run time, Kondo explained that eight minutes seemed insufficient to convey the kind of story that he and Tsutsumi wanted to tell - one in which a character's perception of life significantly changes. However, Kondo hopes that in the future, they will be able to make films with "just as much emotion in a shorter format."

Story development

Primarily interested in the opportunity of collaborating, Kondo and Tsutsumi did not have any specific story in mind when they commenced. They enjoy similar types of films, but did not immediately settle into the writing process - it took them some time to "find a way to do it together", Tsutsumi said. Their first idea centered on an old miner and his dog. This then evolved through four or five different iterations, before manifesting in its final form. Drawing inspiration from The Little Dutch Boy, a folktale about a young boy who saves his town by placing his finger in a dike, Kondo and Tsutsumi devised a character who would hold similar responsibility, except on a day-to-day basis.
Thematically, the duo sought to craft a story that would be true to familiar ordeals - they wanted anyone to be able to relate to the story. The dark fog that encroaches upon the town serves two purposes: it comments on the "contemporary reality" of pollution, while also symbolizing Pig's struggle with internal demons. Kondo explained that both he and Tsutsumi desired to create a world that feels "impermanent", in which things "don't seem like they can last forever." Both directors enjoy films that are "slow-paced, poetic, very quiet." Although they tried to capture this aesthetic in The Dam Keeper, they were also concerned about the film lagging, and so they worked with their editor, Bradley Furnish, to make sure that the film has a balanced pace.
Tsutsumi has named Frédéric Back as his prime influence as an animator. "He always had something to say. For him, figuring out what was happening in society came first, before his craft", Tsutsumi said. Although the two directors did not seek to make a "social statement" with their film, commentary on world issues flowed naturally into their story. "e tried hard to stay true to who we are", Tsutsumi said. e are very conscious of what is happening today." Kondo has named Don Bluth as one of his influences, and both have named Hayao Miyazaki, as well as the films of Walt Disney - in particular, Pinocchio, Dumbo, and One Hundred and One Dalmatians.
Many people have asked Kondo if Pig was based on him, and if Fox was based on Tsutsumi. However, each character was actually based on both filmmakers. "I think Pig might be who we are, but Fox is who we want to be", Tsutsumi explained. He described himself and Kondo as both being "somewhat introverted". Although he supposes that they are not quite as introverted as Pig, he feels that many artists are.
A test screening of the first story reel was organized for a group of Kondo and Tsutsumi's friends who had more writing experience than the two former art directors. As described by Kondo, the screening was "a disaster." The two directors recognized for themselves that the story was not working as they had wanted it to. "That was devastating", Tsutsumi said. The story was coming across as overly "heady" and did not connect emotionally. Although Kondo and Tsutsumi had wanted to finalize the story before starting production, they now had to revise it, while concurrently working on other aspects of the film. Otherwise, they would not have stayed on schedule. Looking forward, Kondo has noted that difficulties like this are unavoidable. He has said that he only hopes to be "more nimble" in dealing with them in the future.
One scene was cut from the finished film. It was halfway through animation at the time and was removed since the directors thought that it "distracted from the emotional arc" of the story. In the scene, Pig loses track of the time, crying alone in a classroom after school. As he rushes home to the windmill, the fog nearly rolls into the town.