Jan Svankmajer

June 23rd, 2009

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Jan Svankmajer is a Czech surrealist who makes some of the most interesting live action/stop motion blended films ever. One of my favorite works from him is a modernized version of Faust, in which a man is tormented by puppets and clay beings as he searches for the Devil in order to gain knowledge and power. This movie is responsible for a large part of my inspiration for Lo (my own feature about demons). Svankmajer also adapted a version of Alice in wonderland in which he surrounded a live action girl with an array of horrible and fascinating stop motion creatures. 

The short film above has always made me happy and is a great introduction to his style. If you enjoy this then I recommend you check out one of his feature films.

Much love

Travis

Tags: alic, czech cinema, faust, humans from clay, jan svankmajer, little otik, travis betz
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7 Responses to “Jan Svankmajer”

• lunerrrrs says:

  June 23, 2009 at 9:14 am

  Omg the part with the penis is HILARIOUS!!!!
• rob says:

  June 23, 2009 at 11:38 am

  Trav – what a cool thing to watch. I thought it was a torso trying to get in… and such a surprise to see a limp dick. totally cool stop motion, probably the most interesting i’ve ever seen, and to think it was from 1989! thanks – good way to start the day watching this.
  rob -
• travis says:

  June 23, 2009 at 12:53 pm

  You would like that, Luners….sheesh.
• travis says:

  June 23, 2009 at 12:54 pm

  Hey Rob, how goes all? Glad you liked the short. Svankmajer is a huge inspiration to me. Check out is Alice in Wonderland sometime (called, ALICE).
• cierrablue says:

  June 24, 2009 at 7:22 am

  I love Jan’s work. You should also talk about The Brother’s Quay. It makes me sad that so many people don’t know who they are.
• Lived2 says:

  July 4, 2009 at 3:24 pm

  I am really glad that I am from CZ…:-)
  I am happy that you like Mr. Svankmajer, I remember most of his short films and it is absolutely AMAZING…:-)
  ps…it was funny with the penis and cold water…:-))
• Adam says:

  December 7, 2009 at 7:33 pm

  Glad to see you are a fan of Jan’s work. My favorite movie of his is probably Little Otik, Faust is really great too. Dimensions of Dialogue is my favorite short of his.