Critical Studies: Brothers Quay

Brothers Quay are two of the most remarkable filmmakers  of our time. Working in collaboration since at least 1969, when they first moved to London from the United States, their stop - action films have introduced a generation of viewers to a lyrical darkness not often associated with animation. Influenced heavily by Central European writers and artists their work reflects the dark psychology resulting form a  century of industrial warfare, surrealist art and dialectical politics. For example they especially been inspired by figures like Polish killed by a German Nazi officer Bruno Schultz , on whose story "Street of Crocodiles" is based. As well as German Dada painter Max Ernst, but also the influential multimedia Czech filmmaker and puppeteer Jan Svankmajer. The latter it is noteworthy has also influenced other famous noted individuals such as film director Tim Burton and the American-born British screenwriter, director and actor Terry Gillam, who is also a member of the Monty Python troupe. Stephen and Timothy Quay would in fact be such great admirers  of Svankmajer that they dedicate on of their short films to him, entitled "The Cabinet of  Jan Svankmajer"  (1984).

This was probably the most mysterious and bizarre animations I have ever seen, in a good way. After watching I felt rather confused and had all these questions running through my head (like: why the action was happening in that particular evironment? why did they use all the machinery? what's the purpose of it?) The puppets were something from the horror movies, had different body parts attached, and sometimes missing those. In my opinion, this animation had one huge flaw - music. The sounds were so annoying that I had to turn off the animation just to rest my ears and then get back to it afterwards. I have to say that they have approached the world of stop-motion in different way. 

Puppets, toys and dolls with missing limbs, misplaced parts, an metal armatures showing through their torn and frayed clothing that's how mainly Brothers Quay characters look like.