Time Piece (1965)

It was only after "Sesame Street" debuted that Jim Henson became a household name. Of course, that wasn't his first foray into the public eye. The man who created the Muppets had been working on stuff since the '50s, but his avant-garde 1965 short "Time Piece" is also worth seeing. This film has no discernible plot. It focuses on time, whether as an abstract concept, or as the dominant force in our lives (to the extent that it imprisons us). Henson plays a man who walks to the beat of a ticking clock. A few other things happen, all set to a beat.The antics of Bert & Ernie, as well as Kermit & Piggy, showed everyone that Henson was capable of creating some far-out material. But here, he goes for the surreal. In a good way. Definitely worth seeing. Watch for a young Frank Oz (the voice of Fozzie, and the director of "The Muppets Take Manhattan", "Little Shop of Horrors", "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels", "What About Bob?", "In & Out", "Bowfinger" and the original "Death at a Funeral") in one scene.

Just saw this early experimental short by the creator of the Muppets, Jim Henson, on YouTube as linked by Amid on Cartoon Brew. It's basically an abstract animated slide show of Henson walking to work, having dinner with his wife, jumping on a pogo (with other people on that at various moments), etc. All done to a constant drumbeat with occasional cries of "Help!" from Henson. There's some adult humor here so I don't recommended this to children. Some of the cuts and montage that I remember from the Muppets' later TV show "Seseme Street" probably came from here. Anyone who thinks of Jim Henson as mainly a children's puppeteer would probably really be blown away with Time Piece. If you liked this, there's a short Henson did with sound man Raymond Scott called Ripples, also on YouTube. Highly recommended!

This is an experimental film done early in Jim Henson's career--before he achieved national prominence. While I didn't enjoy it and didn't see it as a great artistic triumph (despite the Oscar he received for Best Live Action Short), I am thrilled that he made it because it gave him a chance to experiment and hone his craft. Interestingly, the film has none of his Muppets--even though for almost a decade he'd been using them on local (Washington, DC).The film has a beat (such as drum or cymbal) every second and the action changes--almost slide show style. Much of it seemed rather random, though some of the seemingly random images weren't (such as the obvious phallic imagery). Clever at times, but not a film I'd want to see again.

I remember seeing this short in elementary school (stop doing the math!) and have loved it ever since. It was screened at the same time as "Help, My Snowman's Burning Down" and "Clay", both exemplary shorts on their own, but my favorite was always "Time Piece". The hapless subject's strange situations and his plaintive cries of "help!" (especially when his head was, literally, served up on a platter) were priceless and led to a spirited discussion of the meaning of the film. Now that I know it was done by Jim Henson, I'm not surprised it was so good! A definite must-see for its composition and the execution of the scenes as each jump-cut leads to a new, sometimes visually jarring, sometimes amusing, image.