With all apologies to Marshal McLuhan, the medium is not always the message. Good movies, like good computer games, deliver the message in the form of a well-told story that clicks with the viewers. Seems simple enough but when you think of studios and CGI houses with 200  million failing to do it, you get the idea. Which brings me to good ol Robert McKee and his maxim “It’s the story!” And boy ol boy, does Writer/Director/Actor Jim Connell and his film troupe Avant Guard Films have it in spades in his 2006 animated short “Saul Goodman.” Like a cross between Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow and “The Usual Suspects”, Connell’s superbly paced film explodes in your head.

An old political wonk, voiced by actor John Cammarata, and a smart-as-a-whip college student, voiced by actor Eric Scheiner, miss the midnight train out of Boston, MA. Eying the TV where the story of a hit-and-run suspect is in a standoff with police, the two get to talking. Often times when watching animated films, the stilted (bad) dialogue will not allow you to engage with, much less care about, characters or their story. No problems here. The old politico and the student fall right into a natural conversation that gets into the Presidential candidate the old man used to work for, and like DePalma’s “Blowout”, just gets deeper, deeper..and deeper. Connell jumps between characters, genres, and settings almost seamlessly and more importantly, believably. Many try a complicated, non-linear plot for artistic reasons ostensibly, but lose many viewers along the way (see David Lynch’s “Inland Empire”) which is fine ( I liked the film) but other’s prefer the discovery and “aha’ aspect of a tightly crafted plot. But craft it too tight and it loses the click, that hard to define thing that makes a film really come alive. Part of the reason “Saul Goodman” works is because of the humor and pacing Connell doles out at exactly the right time.

Connell’s framing of scenes are tight and he avoids the bloat the kills many animated films. (see Kerry Conran’s “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow”) The score by Ricardo Poza is not intrusive or overbearing, very subtle in fact. From the wilderness cabin of a mad bomber, to inside the paranoia and kinky sex of a ruthless political candidate, to a Japanese laboratory that seeks to find a new way to perceive reality, Connel’s film will take you on an intellectual bullet train and comes highly, highly recommended. It has been in numerous film festivals and has garnered heaps of praise. He seemingly can do it all and I suspect he will; just keep telling good stories, Mr. Connell.

-         rev. by Jerry Brewington

-         Jim Connel and Avant Guard Films can be contacted at jimconnell@sualgoodman.net or visit their website at www.saulgoodman.net