# animate! › Films › Hotel Central by Matt Hulse › all › synopses › direction & collaboration › full production credits › film stills › tools & processes › format & distribution › background material

Canonical: https://animate.org.uk/films/hotelcentral/all

Discovery terms: 2000s animation, travel, disorientation, experimental short film, filmmaker, artist

The following is the archived page text; discovery terms above are separately sourced metadata.

Archive status: restored in 2026; historical calls, deadlines and services are closed.

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**Hotel Central** a film by Matt Hulse

2000, 9 min 52 sec

![Hotel Central, still](https://animate.org.uk/stillslarge/hotelcentral01.jpg)

### animate! synopsis

Hats on for this journey into an old country past. Room service with a difference: the phone rings in the wardrobe or the wilds. Nobody and everyman home. A grab bag of styles help us to feel like a man adrift in woodland.

### short synopsis

We are floating somewhere between **Les Vacances de M. Hulot** and **The Exorcist**, thirty miles southwest of Leipzig, holding onto our hats.

### key credits

**director**
Matt Hulse

**guest**
Joost Van Veen

**lighting camera**
Roel van de Maaden

**animation**
Matt Hulse

**editor**
Hozger Mohaupt

**music**
A Normal Boy

**sound designer**
Gerald Mair

**producer**
Aimara Reques

### Matt Hulse

#### short biography

Matt’s [practice](http://www.lux.org.uk/featured.html) crosses boundaries between film, video, animation, interactivity and installation. In 1994 he completed the Electronic Imaging course at Duncan of Jordanstone and his many prizewinning [films](http://www.idlevice.com/) that have followed were screened in a retrospective at Dresden Filmfest 2002.

His first animate! work was [Hotel Central](https://animate.org.uk/films/hotelcentral/) which shared with Jean Luc Godard the Special Award for Film at the Split Festival of New Cinema 2001. He lives in Edinburgh.

3 November 2004

#### artist statement

The film is a fleeting and intense exploration of large, cold isolated office blocks and lone, alienated workers, stuck in bizarre routines in a nasty grey oppressive city. You may have heard of lone soldiers in the jungle who are still fighting the Vietnam War when it’s been over for 30 years?

Our characters here are similar, like workers carrying on at their desk in desperation after some terrible urban disaster. Meanwhile the computers and offices have evolved and are able to move/change/dance – this is where the animation comes in!

### animate! films by this artist

[Half Life](https://animate.org.uk/films/halflife/)

[Hotel Central](https://animate.org.uk/films/hotelcentral/)

#### artist’s website

[Idlevice](http://www.idlevice.com)

Matt’s own website

### a film by Matt Hulse

### direction

**director**
Matt Hulse

### cast in picture

**guest**
Joost Van Veen

### live-action personnel

**lighting camera**
Roel van de Maaden
Jim Rusk
Erik Ziege

### image personnel

**animation**
Matt Hulse

**titles**
Room 8 Studios

**editor**
Hozger Mohaupt

### sound personnel

**music**
A Normal Boy

**sound designer**
Gerald Mair

### production personnel

**production manager**
Lucy Brown

**producer**
Aimara Reques

### support

**thanks**
Royal Hotel, Kathy Friend, Adam Squires, Rob Kennedy, Ruth Pendragon, Han Vio Maaden, GNAC, GHS, LCH

**primary funding**
Arts Council of England/Channel Four

© Matt Hulse 2000

[![Hotel Central, still](https://animate.org.uk/stillslarge/hotelcentral01.jpg)](https://animate.org.uk/stillsfull/hotelcentral01.jpg)

*click on image for full size still*

[![Hotel Central, still](https://animate.org.uk/stillslarge/hotelcentral02.jpg)](https://animate.org.uk/stillsfull/hotelcentral02.jpg)

*click on image for full size still*

### master copy format

**colour or black & white**
black & white

### video distribution format

**video format**
BetaSP

**screen aspect ratio**
4:3

**video standard**
PAL

**sound type**
stereo

### distributor

LUX
[info@lux.org.uk](mailto:info@lux.org.uk)
+44 (0)20 7503 3980
[www.lux.org.uk](http://www.lux.org.uk/)

**Hotel Central** film, stills and other materials © Matt Hulse 2000