In this mostly animated experiment, the filmmaker Phil Tippett leads us through a stop-motion inferno of despair and devastation.
Strange and squelchy and all kinds of sick, “Mad God” comes at you with nauseating energy, its flood of dystopian images both playful and repulsive. Merging live action, stunning stop-motion animation and endearingly awkward puppetry, this bleak experiment from the visual-effects titan Phil Tippett is best viewed on a very large screen and after a very small meal.
There’s no real narrative or dialogue. Instead, an overwhelming sense of hopelessness accompanies a gas-masked figure as he’s lowered into a crime-ridden, post-apocalyptic hellscape. His mission is unclear as he follows a toxic yellow river, dodging misshapen monsters and other gurgling horrors. (These are often distressingly visceral, like the array of seated giants, their liquefied feces flooding the mouths of creatures lying beneath them.) Gloopy surgical procedures, performed in derelict rooms by white-coated figures — echoes of “Jacob’s Ladder” (1990) — linger on evisceration and extraction. One of the things extracted might be described as a baby.
Though sprinkled with reminders of Lynch and Cronenberg and others, Tippett’s defiantly adult vision has a freakish originality and a sorrowing tone that’s oddly touching. Humanlike figures are squashed, tortured and consumed by roaming brutes; piteous squawks and rattles pepper a soundtrack soothed by Dan Wool’s moving musical score. Alongside, Chris Morley’s gorgeously tactile cinematography adds texture and depth to Tippett’s nightmarish vision.
Conceived decades ago and resurrected in part as a training ground for a generation of special-effects artists weaned solely on computers, “Mad God” is a vivid and valuable showcase for disappearing skills. In the press notes, Tippett admits his film “kind of defies description.” I tried my best.
Mad God
Not rated. Running time: 1 hour 23 minutes. Watch on Shudder.
Source: Movies - nytimes.com
