Harpy (1979)

I've always enjoyed short films and this animated effort is one of the best I've seen. Created by Belgian auteur Raoul Servais, it's a simple reworking of a legend from ancient Greece, that of the harpy who torments men by eating all of their food. Servais uses animation to great effect, as real actors are transformed and become people living in a make-believe world that looks quirky and beautiful at the same time.Eliciting excellent performances from the two leads, Will Spoor and Fran Waller Zeper, this eight-minute feature is utterly weird and often horrific, and it's currently doing the Internet rounds on account of its scary nature. Its top-class animation makes it unmissable for those with an interest in the arts while in the meantime it stands alone as a horror film far more terrifying than 90% of recent genre fare.

This eight-minute animated short film has more atmosphere, more dread, than a dozen slasher movies put together. A man rescues a strange, bird-like creature who is being strangled on a public street. He takes it home.The thing is a harpy, a woman with a bird's body, derived from Greek myths. It does only one thing -- snatching food out of human hands. Well -- this one is also capable of eating half its host, removing his body parts from the waist down.The harpy comes to dominate its rescuer's life. He begins to starve, sneaks out the door, tries to disguise himself as a statue, and chows down on some pomme frites, but the creature finds him and snatches the tidbits from his hand.Finally he attacks the harpy and begins to strangle it, just as its previous host had done, but a police officer runs up and bops the man on the head. We can only imagine what the police officer's life is going to be like, now that he's acquired this half-avian companion.There is no eerie music, none of the usual accompaniments of the unearthly tale, but every scene takes place at night and, with two slight exceptions, no one else is present.The original harpies were limited in their mischief to grabbing things out of your hands before you hand a chance to enjoy them, kind of like those long-tailed birds called "camp robbers" or like my ex wife, but in later tales they became vengeful, punishing those who had committed evil deeds, having been confused with the Eumenides or the Furies.It's short, but it's effective too.

I must say now that i rarely give any movie as high a rating as I've done here. I saw this short film on Eat Carpet in the middle of the night with a couple of friends and by the time it was finished we were so paranoid that our feet were tucked up on the couch with us. this short is absolutely brilliant. it uses a surreal texture drawn collage background with delayed-frame images in the foreground to create artistic and unsettling atmosphere. the harpy itself looks terrifying, especially when it feeds. the musical score fits brilliantly with the somewhat shocking messiness of the harpy's actions. the absence of words adds to the atmosphere. it is truly creepy there is honestly nothing that i can say is wrong with this film. it is perfect and is one of the only things I've seen that has actually truly creeped me out. i strongly recommend that anybody and everybody views this movie alone in the dark when u already feel insecure and uneasy. it is truly amazing!

I saw this when I was very young and have never forgotten it. I recently unearthed it and was still very disturbed by it. It seems to have a direct affect on me and I find the harpya itself quite terrifying. Waiting for it to appear as the poor man is trying to escape is extremely tense and makes me feels very anxious. It is a disturbing portrait of how life has spiralled out of control for the protagonist and he is now kept trapped by this strange creature, forced to be subservient to it and pander to its hungry needs. A nightmarish film which has stayed with me for many years. As disturbing as The Vanishing(original) or Eraserhead but due to its length leaves a strong aftertaste that remains. Powerful stuff and unique.