The Pied Piper is an incredible Czechoslovakian stop-motion film from 1986, directed by Jiří Barta. The Czech title of this film is Krysař, which translates to "The Rat Catcher." Although this film is based on a fairy tale, it's pretty creepy and not really a children's film. It was shown at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival, and received lots of praise.
I'm a lover of stop motion films, and Barta's work features an incredibly well-constructed stop-motion universe. I'm a huge fan of Barta's use of wood as an animation medium. The carved, wooden faces of the characters give them a depth and uncanny eeriness that I adore. It also caught me off guard (in a good way) when the puppets began to eat, and they were eating what looked like real, human food. I thought this was an awesome, grotesque touch to the film.
