Broken Pencil Issue 103 – Summer 2024
For four years, 3D artist Julian Glander worked on his feature film debut Boys Go to Jupiter. It’s a self-described DIY project – he worked on every aspect of the film, from animation to music to script, with a small cast of collaborators including producer Peisin Yang Lazo. This June, it premiered at Tribeca Festival. “I just submitted it. I didn’t think they would want it,” Glander says. “But they took it. It’s beyond my dream.”
Boys Go to Jupiter follows a teenager raising $5,000 through gig work in a bizzaro Florida (imagine that). The “gig economy” film is a growing genre in the 2020s, with films like Spree (2020), The Killer (2023), and Do Not Expect Too Much From The End of the World (2023). Glander’s film is a more light-hearted take on the topic, described as “an indie comedy that just happens to be a gorgeous cartoon.”
Glander’s background is as varied as his credits. His most notable work are animated shorts he created for Cartoon Network and HBO’s Max. He also illustrated for the New Yorker and the New York Times, developed the video game “ART SQOOL” for PC & Nintendo Switch, and published his comic book “3D SWEETIES.” His artwork is recognizable for its surreal scenes, geometric models, and limited pastel palettes. Boys Go to Jupiter is a leap out of this contractual tub into the self-produced infinite pool.
“In my head, it was like if I could do ten minutes [for a short], I could just do that nine times in a row and that would be a feature film.” He laughs at himself. “So that was my ridiculous, wrong approach going into it.”
The process was far more tedious. “I think if I had known how hard it was going to be, I probably wouldn’t have done it,” he says, though he contends after completing the film, “it actually wasn’t so bad.” The film started as a comic featuring a “delivery driver as the perfect sort of vehicle to tell a story, the way you can move around a city and meet all these new people.” That led to a TV pitch, to a longer treatment, to character models and animated bits that eventually led to Glander realizing he was making a movie.
The excitement of the project didn’t sink under the sunk cost fallacy. “Barring anything else that happens with this film, even if it’s a total dud, I think learning a hundred new skills and seeing things from a hundred new viewpoints has been my biggest win on this project,” Glander says. He also learned how to set his own limits, financial aid leading to creative gain. He circumvented expensive animated walking cycles by coming up with new ways characters can move. “In this movie, nobody walks. People are riding on segways, on scooters. People never get out of their cars. They’re behind fences like the guy on Home Improvement. We also looked at the Muppets to see how they move without legs.”
The film boasts an esoteric cast who play little aliens and mad scientists: Jack Corbett, Janeane Garofalo, Elsie Fisher, Joe Pera, Julio Torres, among others. On casting, Glander says, “Comedy is a world that I’m in. These are very much my people.” So even the voices you hear reflect the same personality you find visually and textually. It isn’t just a reflection of the world, it’s Julian Glander’s world – wayward and vibrant.