They came to switch off his head

By Sarah Heeringa, November 29, 2006 @ 2 am

Tom Reilly is avoiding the fight for funding with his claymation feature

The Ambassador’s Demise

Wallace and Gromit eat your heart out! Award-winning local director Tom Reilly begins shooting next month on The Ambassador’s Demise, a claymation short film destined to become part of a feature-length film.

The Ambassador’s Demise tells the story of a little blue man, a chain-smoking, disembodied human head, and their special relationship. It’s based on a 12-minute short, The Ambassador’s Brain, which was nominated for best short film in the 2006 Screen Awards.

Reilly says by creating nine short films, he’s avoiding the fight for funding that often happens with a full-blown feature. “This is not exactly mainstream,” he says. The Ambassador’s Demise is self-funded, and Reilly hopes each short film will build up a snowball effect of support. “We have a few people interested, who like what they see,” he says.

The Ambassador’s Demise is due for release “when it’s finished”—probably late 2006 or early 2007—because time is the only resource the team has plenty of. “The main emphasis of the project is to have fun doing it,” he says. “This is a creative project that keeps us sane. If we have to work on it for ten years to get it right, we will—but hopefully we’ll have it done before then!”