Movies: Stephen Quay

In 2015, Christopher Nolan curated a selection of short films by the surrealist animators the Quay Brothers to be distributed as a touring 35mm presentation. The three films—"In Absentia" (2000), "The Comb" (1991) and "Street of Crocodiles" (1986)—we...

The exploration of the effects of an unexpected catastrophe, known as VUE (violent unknown event) through the bios of 92 survivors....

Dark fairytale about a demonic doctor who abducts a beautiful opera singer with designs on transforming her into a mechanical nightingale....

A puppet, newly released from his strings, explores the sinister room in which he finds himself....

A woman sits alone on a chair at a table in a room on one of the top floors of an asylum. Bright spot lights dot the night, sometimes shining on her window. She sharpens pencils and writes on a page in a copy book. The pencil point often breaks under...

Stop-motion animated short film in which, among other things, a man made of wire looks malevolent....

Jakob arrives at the Institute Benjamenta (run by brother and sister Johannes and Lisa Benjamenta) to learn to become a servant. With seven other men, he studies under Lisa: absurd lessons of movement, drawing circles, and servility. He asks for a be...

Stop-motion animated short film in which a puppet on a trike captures a puppet bird-man....

A magnet moves on a floor. A moth beats against a window. A doll child watches the magnet; threads of metal filings gather around the magnet....

A man journeys by rail to a nameless sanatorium where his father has recently died. Once there, time loses its linearity and he finds himself in a world that appears both strange and strangely familiar....

In Prague, a professorial puppet, with metal pincers for hands and an open book for a hat, takes a boy as a pupil. First, the professor empties fluff and toys from the child's head, leaving him without the top of his head for most of the film. The pr...

"Maska" is the latest animated film of Quay brothers, directors and puppet animators, with the music composed by Krzysztof Penderecki. The film is an adaptation of Stanisław Lem’s short story of the same title. The action of “Maska” is set in a techn...

A porcelain doll’s explorations of a dreamer’s imagination....

A documentary on the subject of the collections of books, instruments and medical anomalies at The College of Physicians of Philadelphia and the Mutter Museum housed there. This short film represents the first to be made by the internationally recogn...

Explores some of the most innovative attempts by contemporary artists, filmmakers, architects etc to explore multiple Temporalities and to counter the uniform sense of time promoted by our technology-driven society....

Another short, grainy film from the Quay Brothers. This one has funny singing in it....

One of several collaborative dance films by the Brothers Quay & (dancer, choreographer) William Tuckett. Little enough info around on line, but there's briefly by way of Wikipedia entry. Adapted rather loosely from the works of the E.T.A. Hoffman. Fa...

The Quays' interest in esoteric illusions finds its perfect realization in this fascinating animated lecture on the art of anamorphosis. This artistic technique, often used in the 16th- and 17th centuries, utilizes a method of visual distortion with ...

Janacek: Intimate Excursions is a short experimental documentary that attempts to find visual references in the correspondence of Leos Janacek, the Czechoslovak composer....

A display at the strange and wonderful artifacts in a collection of medical curiosities....