NICER THAN THEY THINK THEY ARE is based on the quote ‘Les gens sont bien plus beaux qu’ils croient’ (People are much nicer than they think they are) by Jean Dubuffet and inspired by the Picasso painting ‘Deux femmes courant sur la plage’. The short plasticine animation brings the ceramic figurines to life in a brief narrative that shows how a woman leaves her everyday urban environment and travels to the beach where she finds herself transformed. On her return to her life in the city she is reminded of the potential of her other unselfconscious self.

6 min, 16 mm,

plasticine animation

with clay figures and paper cut-outs.

set in Cardiff, Wales.

Sound: Markus Jungmann

Camera rental: Norbert Hobrecht

Music used:

‘Six Marimbas’ by Steve Reich

‘Johnsburg Illinois’,

‘16 Shells From A Thirty-Ought-Six’ and

‘Clap Hands’  by Tom Waits.

Funded by a Welsh Film Council Production Award 1992