Quay Brothers: The Short Films, 1979-2003 first published by Film4 in 2006 to coincide with the release of BFI’s two-disc DVD collection Summary: In these thirteen artfully animated shorts by the Quay Brothers, puppets break free of their strings, museum exhibits run riot, and the inmates take over the asylum. Review: When the BFI was in the…
Alice first published by EyeforFilm “Stick to the text!”, the King of Hearts demands – in vain – near the end of Jan Svankmajer‘s Alice, as the titular heroine (played by Kristýna Kovoutová) refuses to read out her scripted statement in court, let alone to bow to his or the Queen’s arbitrary authority. The King’s…
Insect (Hmyz) first published by EyeforFilm Entomology has long played a part in Bohemian allegorical art. In Franz Kafka’s 1915 novella The Metamorphosis, Gregor Samsa famously wakes up to discover that he had been transformed into a monstrous insect, and then must vainly try to renegotiate his place in a household that now proves less…
Lunacy (Sílení) first published by EyeforFIlm “Ladies and gentlemen, what you are about to see is a horror film, with all the degeneracy peculiar to that genre.” In case we are not aware that we are watching a film by Jan Svankmajer (Alice, Faust, Conspirators Of Pleasure, Little Otik), his fifth feature opens with the sound…