Héctor López Carmona's animated feature film, ROY DEL ESPACIO (aka ROY FROM SPACE) was released to theaters in 1983. The film, animated mostly by amateur or first-time animators (many of them members of Carmona's and producer Ulises Pérez Aguirre's family), was seen as amateurish and uncommercial. In the light of 40+ years, it has a homemade, almost psychedelic feel to it, as well as a freewheeling joy that's utterly infectious.
The third-ever animated feature film made in Mexico, ROY FROM SPACE disappeared without a trace, with not so much as a scrap of footage available on youtube, no stills, nothing. Until now.
Deaf Crocodile is in the process of restoring ROY FROM SPACE for its first-ever physical media release anywhere, and our Kickstarter campaign ends on April 30. The restoration and release was created with the permission and support of Carmona and Aguirre's family and features interviews with Andrea Pérez Mata and Ulises Pérez Mata, children of ROY FROM SPACE producer Ulises Pérez Aguirre, and their cousin, Alejandro Mata, as well as an interview with Carmona's grandson, Héctor Ricardo López Reyes.
There's also a commentary by Armando Hernández & Joey Diaz of the Trash-Mex podcast!
Due to the inclusion of four and a half minutes of pirated live-action footage (from a legendary Japanese B-movie) being cut into the actual negative, something that would be impossible to license, Deaf Crocodile hired animators Brian Smee and Isabelle Aspin to recreate the pirated footage in ROY's style. We've just released 40 seconds of in-progress restoration footage that features Smee and Aspin's animation, which is painted on period-appropriate cels with vintage paints and transferred to 16mm before rescanning to closely match the original look.
The Kickstarter includes a KS-specific slipcover by artist Haleigh Buck that will only be available via the Kickstarter campaign - only enough copies will be printed to send to backers. The regular deluxe slipcover was drawn by Love & Rockets' Gilbert Hernandez, with color work by Richard Cox. A standard edition with art by Beth Morris will also be available. A limited number of spaceship drawings created for the animation are also available.
Thanks for reading!