feel slightly embarrassed . I watched this short animated film by Edson Oda and while watching I was 100 per cent convinced I was watching a Russian language film . Yeah I know it might seem strange that the Western genre might have been popular in Eastern Europe but let's not forget Sergio Leone was a regarded and known film maker in the Soviet Union . His films did contain a Marxist subtext and Leone spent many years trying to develop his life work a tribute to the battle of Leningrad , a film that eventually came to nothing on the director's death
Death is at the centre of MALARIA and revolves around the ancient human legend that Death comes to people in a physical human form . The story is told by a series of story boards being turned and moved on a table . Nice to know Bob has a problem trying to explain this technique because while watching this I knew I'd have the exact same problem coming here . To be honest I did find the story within a concept somewhat distracting and thought the film might have worked better if it was just a straight animation short because the animation is very good even if it's a bit static . I'm guessing that is the reason why it's a cartoon within a film ?
That said the story is very involving and contains a great premise. A mercenary is hired to kill death for 30 pieces of gold and the arguments put forward are very intelligent . Who wants to live forever ? Bad enough an individual can live forever but multiply this by a few billion and geometrically multiply that by a few billion more and you can see the problem in killing death and that death is a great benefit to humanity . Also having a mercenary getting paid 30 pieces of gold alludes to Judas and Christianity so the story has some appeal to both secularists and Christians alike
