Floyd Norman: An Animated Life (2016)

(On Cable TV, March 2020) Chances are that you don’t know Floyd Norman, but chances are also that you’ll think of him very fondly after watching the great documentary biopic Floyd Norman: An Animated Life. While Norman worked his entire life in the field of animation, he is not someone who’s easily identifiable—he was never credited as a director, bounced between studios (but is better known for the animation work he did at Disney) and was known as a strong personality within his field, even if it took time before he was given due credit as a veteran of the artform. While one of his claims to fame is having become the “first Disney African-American animator” in 1956, Norman talks about his Southern California upbringing as one relatively free of racial tensions. It’s when you put together these strands of personal history, and combine it with his grander-than-life personality, that Norman emerges as a fascinating subject for a biography. Generously illustrated through animated segments, it showcases a very funny, very witty guy at age 79. His troublemaker moments at Disney are covered in gleeful detail, along with more troubling matters of agism. The intersection of what he’s known for—the art of animation, the reality of life within Disney, advancing black rights—are what makes An Animated Life interesting. Directors Michael Fiore and Erik Sharkey don’t pull punches in discussing his divorce, remarriage (to someone as funny and interesting as he is) and anger issues. Talking heads asked to contribute to the documentary include some major animation figures such as Paul Dini and Dean DeBlois. Anyone eager to learn more about the nitty-gritty of animation work will be even more pleased with the result. The question “why a documentary about Floyd Norman?” gets obvious answers the longer the film goes on—and his obscurity at the top of the producer-director totem pole becomes an asset when the film avoids mythologizing the influence of those positions and focuses instead on the realities of the craft of animation. Terrific subject, great documentary—don’t miss An Animated Life if you have even the slightest interest in the past few decades of American animation.