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TALES OF THE BROTHER QUAY
Written, Directed, Photographed, & Designed by: Stephen & Timothy Quay.
Zeitgeist Films.
134 min. Not Rated.

Looking through my various scribbled notes during this retrospective of 13 films, I find repetitive comments and a mix of varied praises and putdowns probably because, in general, once you’ve seen one work from the Quay brothers (Stephen and Timothy), you’ve seen ‘em all. After having already viewed a few of their shorts over the years, I’d much rather see these at my own leisure than all at once – it’s too much. The Quay’s style and subject matter – which often includes little industrial creatures or machines or found objects in bizarre dreamscapes – verges on becoming an assault on the senses after a while. A short here and a short there provide great glimpses into their psyches, of men who project their twisted, poetic imaginations onto stop-motion animation. More often than not they make Tim Burton look like the most mainstream director out there.

Even when their films make no sense whatsoever – and not even in the fulfilling abstract manner à la David Lynch – the directors are incredibly accomplished craftsmen, who put so much detail into their models, their sets, and their incredibly baroque lighting set-ups. Still, even the most striking compositions and movements can start to become tedious. “The Comb” is an example of that, an 18-minute experience of seeing a woman asleep, dreaming of a labyrinth of a playhouse. In a work like this, there’s an impenetrable quality.

Only two films, really, could I call close to being masterworks: “Street of Crocodiles,” where a man takes a sort of magic box and looks inside at a small, run-down Eastern European city, where a figure looks on as dolls rip apart objects, and screws, becoming undone from the floorboards, dance around. Here one sees the imagination and technical prowess of the Quays in full, concentrated bloom. The other is “Anamorphosis” (or “De Artificiali Perspectiva”), where a heavy-accented narrator talks about how perspective changes by the way one looks at objects (with the Quays providing a little figure looking through an eyepiece at paintings). It’s almost like the greatest short film to show incoming art students, to weed out who is and who isn’t really interested in how an artist’s own perception involves the viewer as well.

Overall, this retrospective left me in wonderment and bemusement in equal measure, where I would often not want to look away but did not see how the abstractions, no matter how many times repeated or put to use within any given theme, could connect to anything. So I would actually recommend the DVD set that has been out for quite a while (which is where I first saw “Anamorphosis” and “Street of Crocodiles”) released by Kino Video, as one can take breaks. For die-hard fans of the Quays, of course, I’d say it’s the event of the year. But to those who have no idea of what to expect, be warned, or at least cautioned. Jack Gattanella
January 19, 2007