6 minute read
Within the Crystal Hills
NH native’s animated film breathes new life into Old Man’s story
BY EMILY REILY / ANIMATION STILLS COURTESY GRIFFIN HANSEN
Though film director Griffin Hansen of Goffstown doesn’t remember seeing the Old Man of the Mountain, its peculiar profile still left a strong impression on him.
“I wasn’t alive for most of the Old Man’s tenure. If I ever saw him, I wouldn’t remember it,” Hansen says.
But that didn’t stop him from being inspired by the ages-old glacier-carved rock formation that crumbled from Cannon Mountain in Franconia on May 3, 2003. The Old Man’s prominent, sharp-angled features has sparked copious origin stories by Indigenous people, witty observations from Daniel Webster and timeless poems by Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Hansen’s visit to Mammoth Cave in Kentucky inspired him to write a love story between two star-crossed characters: the hard-working Sawyer and the beautiful Carrigain (who are only seen through their profiles), and a mysterious mountain.
On June 3, Hansen released his year-long project, the 8-minute animated film, “Within the Crystal Hills,” a colorful reinterpretation of the profile’s origin story.
Hansen storyboarded, directed and edited the film, with help from about 50 people — including Hansen’s grandmother and a longtime friend — and Hansen was quick to thank all of them.
Hansen recently talked with New Hampshire Magazine about making “Within the Crystal Hills,” a touching story with its own New Hampshire roots.
New Hampshire Magazine: How did you conceptualize the film?
Griffin Hansen: I grew up learning about the Old Man of the Mountain. I was a student at the Savannah College of Art and Design and working on an idea for a new film where I wanted to use shadow puppets. I was really inspired by the idea of geology mixed with shadow puppets after visiting Mammoth Cave in Kentucky. Nothing really seemed to marry those two concepts, until I considered, of all things, the old man of the mountain.
NHM: What went into making this film?
GH: Animation is three important things. The first is writing. The second is what’s called storyboarding, and the third is animating. We did a straightforward narrative and a storyboard that is like a comic book that moves. When you meet your animators, you don’t have to tell them anything, you have to hand them this storyboard and they know exactly what’s going on. It takes about 50 people an entire year to make an eight-minute film like that. Animation is not for the for the impatient.
NHM: It’s easy to see how animated shadow puppets could explain how the Old Man could only be viewed as a profile.
GH: People who are from New Hampshire) say ‘he looks familiar.’ And it isn’t until the end that they put that piece together.
NHM: How was the music created?
GH: The music in the film was composed and performed by a music teacher from Bishop Guertin High school in Nashua, Ben Gorelick. Mr. Gorelick and I have been very close friends since we both went to summer camp together in Alton. He did it all himself on his keyboard and came up with every motif, every idea. We think on such similar wavelengths that I would say ‘this just needs to be darker.’ And he would know instantly what darker was for the both of us.
NHM: The melody Carrigain sings — is that something Ben came up with?
GH: The singing voice for Carrigain is actually our producer and cowriter Christina Caralis. Christina is a classically trained singer. I just told her that I wanted the line ‘I dream of a diamond in the hills’ song. And I said ‘just come up with 10 melodies for it.’
The version that you hear in the film is literally the first version she ever tried. It was sort of haunting, but so warm at the same time that I didn’t even consider any of the other ones.
When Sawyer hears that, he thinks that that means she wants a treasure, right? What he realizes later, is that he is the diamond in the hills, at least for her. And she already has it. I really love the idea of the same line taking on a different meaning depending on when you hear it in the film.
NHM: How did you get your grandmother to narrate?
GH: It wasn’t too hard. My grandmother (Francesca “Chex” Morrissey) is from Raymond, and she’s lived there for her whole life. She just has a fantastic Yankee accent. She’s never been a singer or a dancer or any kind of performer. To have my grandma just read it pretty flat, and just like you’d expect her to read you a bedtime story, I believe really sort of aids in it.
I went back to (my grandparents’) house in Raymond, and in their living room — I brought my microphone. And if you listen hard enough in the audio — we tried our best to cover it up — but you can hear the clock ticking in the background. You can hear my grandpa walking out the door with the fire wood. To me, it adds to this sense of authenticity.
She and my grandfather, they both had seen (the Old Man) a dozen times. Like anybody from New Hampshire, they wouldn’t have any idea that it would be… it was just there, and then it wasn’t there one day, and now it’s so iconic.
NHM: What do you want people to know about animated films that aren’t kids’ movies?
GH: I would hope that this film shows people that when they think about the stories that animation can tell, it doesn’t have to be pigs and bunnies per se. I’m sick of stories about New York and Los Angeles. Give me another story about iron workers in Franconia, New Hampshire — why not?
But the Old Man of the Mountain, that thing that fell down in 2003, in one of the least populated states in the country, a world where somebody wants to make that instead of another Minions movie, is one that I’m really happy to see, because it expands the idea of the stories that animation can tell.
NHM: What message do you want to convey in the film?
GH: Maybe you’ve found yourself in that situation before, where you’re saying ‘is just me enough for this person.’ I hope that this film instills an idea in people that that insecurity you feel about not being enough for somebody that you love a lot, is ill-founded, because while they might be used to caviar and diamond rings and stuff, there’s a reason that they love you.
