Penangkaran Bening Studio offers animated local legends

Gigin W. Utomo, Contributor, Yogyakarta

Children and animated films are like two parts of a coin: One cannot be separated from the other. But if many of them like foreign-made ones, they cannot really be blamed, as not many local versions are screened on television.

A group of people from the Bening Community in Yogyakarta hopes to reverse that trend -- expecting many children to enjoy locally made animated films.

"The things that worry us are not only the increasing number of foreign, animated movies being screened here, but also the bad psychological impact of the screening on children or even teenagers," said Atmadhi Brahmantyo (Bram) of the Bening Community.

He noticed that foreign, animated films were mostly entertaining rather than educational, and often contained violence, which he found "dangerous for children to growth up with."

What was obvious, he said, was the fact that most Indonesian children and teenagers idolized animated figures like Pokemon, Sinchan, Doraemon and Power Rangers, rather than heroes from local folk stories or legends.

"If nothing is done, someday folk stories will be forgotten, not to mention the fading tradition of storytelling in our daily lives," Bram said.

In its efforts to popularize folk stories, Bening Community is now seriously producing animated films on VCD, taking themes from famous local legends, referring to them as the legend of Nusantara (the archipelago).

Under the flag Penangkaran Bening Studio (PBS), they have produced dozens of animated films featuring a variety of folk stories from across the country. Among these are the legends of Joko Kendil (Central Java), Keong Mas (East Java), Putri Nimari (Bali), Joko Thole Dampo Awang (Madura), Putri Hijau (Sumatra), Bawang Merah Bawang Putih, Timun Mas, Roro Mendut, Calon Arang, Si Kancil and Cindelaras.

Bram hopes the VCD-format tales will become an alternative attraction, not only for children and teenagers, but also adults and parents, who might then pass on the morality tales contained in local legends to their children.

"At least we are hoping that the passing-on of legends from the older to the younger generation will continue," Bram said.

Yet, it turned out the community got more than it had anticipated. Although it could be considered a newcomer in the animation world, the community got seriously involved in the business only about two years ago and won the Golden Award at the Pyongyang Film Festival at the end of last year. The award was presented for its animated film, Cindelaras.

"That (winning the award) was beyond our expectations. We were very pessimistic at the time because we there was plenty of tough competition from other countries," said Bram.

Apart from the competition, Bram said, Cindelaras was produced with limited resources and funding, as well as a lack of animators.

The community initially consisted of idealistic artists who gathered for discussions at a house in Baciro village or helped people who had encountered disasters. Their activities were similar to those of non-government organizations but they never declared themselves as one.

In 1990, due to reasons of financial necessity, some of the community's members went to Jakarta to earn a living. There, they received an offer from a businessman in Glodok, West Jakarta, to produce cartoon films.

The offer was a savior, mainly because they were desperate to find work and felt grateful as the job on offer suited their talents. After accepting the offer, they decided to produce cartoon films with Indonesian themes.

Bawang Merah Bawang Putih was the first animated film they produced.

"Of course the quality was far from what we expected, mainly due to the limitations we had in producing it," Bram said.

He explained that the first film was produced by using a wooden board on bricks as their working table, and borrowing a computer from a friend to work on the graphics and digital drawings. There was only a handful of animators, too.

As time went by, they still found it difficult to look for skilled animators in Jakarta to help them meet the business order. For that reason, they finally decided to return to Yogyakarta.

It was in Yogyakarta the group became a business entity in its own right, one of only a handful of producers of animated films in the country. Some 30 animators, who work on either the manual drawings or the digital ones, have joined the company. They are mostly graduates of the Indonesian Institute of Arts (ISI) Yogyakarta and Yogyakarta Fine Arts senior high school (SMSR).

"We are currently providing training for would-be animators and dubbers. We have to do so, otherwise, we would not be able to produce high-quality animated films," said Yusac, in charge of the work at PBS.

Good quality is indeed a priority for Bening. That explains why each of their production processes is always proceeded by a series of studies. If necessary, they arrange to visit the region where a particular folk story has originated. That is done in a bid to understand the story better, which will, in turn, enable them to produce a high-quality end product.

"That way we can visualize the story better in the film, just as in the original description," Bram said.

The products of Penangkaran Bening Studio can now easily be found on the market. At the same time, orders also keep coming in. In terms of marketing, they sell the products just as they are. In other words, Penangkaran Bening Studio is merely a producer. The marketing is fully in the hands of the businessman from Glodok who buys their products.

Initially, each film was sold for Rp 40 million. Now, they are Rp 70 million apiece.

The presence of Nusantara Legend animated films provides a wider choice, not just for children, but also adults. Only, like other recorded products, these particular animated films are also vulnerable to the threat of piracy. That most VCDs available on the market are pirated speaks volumes.