The Birth of the Robot(1936)

The Birth of the Robot Synopsis

This experiment was a “prestige advertisement” for Shell Motor Oil. As conventional animation became dominated by Walt Disney, many European filmmakers turned to puppets as an alternative, and Lye enlisted the help of avant-garde friends such as Humphrey Jennings and John Banting to make the amusing puppets. Exploring the still-complex color process, which involved the combination of three separate images, Lye creates such a vivid storm scene that reviewers hailed it as “proof that the color film has entered a new stage.” The music is Holst’s The Planets. - Harvard Film Archive

The Birth of the Robot (1936) is a animation film directed by Len Lye, released on October 1, 1936 with a runtime of 6m. Viewers rate it 7.0 out of 10 across 12 ratings.