The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
A work of bizarre genius from stop-motion animator Jan Svankmajer. A surrealist take on Alice in Wonderland that is more Eraserhead than Lewis Carroll, filled with Svankmajer’s bizarre Claymation creatures
Quirky, hilarious Australian claymation film about the mail correspondence between a young girl and a lonely middle-aged man
Aardman Animation spread the seemingly universal appeal of their Wallace and Gromit short films out onto the big screen with deliriously nonsensical results
Probably the loudest I have laughed and the most unabashed fun I have had in a theatre all year. The most 100% successful of all of Aardman’s films to date at capturing the quirky and uniquely homesy style of their short films, this comes with gags packed in every single frame
Hilarious Jan Svankmajer film about a mother who decides to treat a log as a child. Full of blackly funny humour before transforming into a macabre monster movie
Czech animator Jan Svankmajer offers up his wonderfully bizarre part-live-action, part-Claymation interpretation of the classic story of Faust and his pact with The Devil
The second Claymation film from Adam Elliot, who made the sublime Mary and Max, concerning the banally hilarious lives of weird, eccentric characters
The first full-length Claymation film from the UK’s Aardman Animations. With typical Aardman eccentricity, this is a parody of a WWII escape film conducted with talking chickens
Completely madcap film from Takashi Miike, a black comedy about a family who run a guesthouse where the guests keep dying. This comes replete with musical numbers and Claymation sequences
Amiable Swiss Claymation effort that makes for inevitable comparison to the output from Aardman Studios
Charming Claymation animated adaptation of the Hans Christian Andersen fairytale from Russia that manages to be a mordant satire on Communism into the bargain
Amiable effort from England’s Aardman Animations that doesn’t quite scale the heights of their other films but still has an entertainingly nonsensical charm that is far more enjoyable than most Hollywood competition
A unique homage to Night of the Living Dead wherein the original has been recreated with a bewildering range of artwork and short pieces of animation from dozens of different artists, even scenes conducted by sock puppets and animated Barbie dolls
Unique anthology that offers 26 episodes from different directors, each ending with a death. The episodes vary wildly in quality but a sufficient number ignore all good taste and/or travel waaaay across taboo lines
Cult Czech stop-motion animator, Jan Svankmajer makes an eccentrically surreal live-action film that focuses on a variety of different people who have strange fetishes
A satiric Claymation animated version of the Manson murders. The film quickly heads for some astonishing bad taste areas, before finding itself in some biting black humour and songs
After 23 years, Aardman Animation make a sequel to their first feature film. Another chicken caper film where they try to capture some of its dotty charms and largely succeed
Aardman Animation give Wallace and Gromit their second film outing
Sequel to the hit multi-director anthology has a less high-profile line-up of directors, nor hits the astonishingly perverse heights of its predecessor. As always some entries never do much but the film finds its stride in the last few episodes
Aardman Animation return with a sequel to Shaun the Sheep Movie. More of the same absurdly nonsensical capers and gags, this comes with much in the way of homage and in-jokes to classic SF films
The third film in the series of stoner comedies trips off into gonzo genre territory. A relentlessly and unashamedly vulgar film that also manages to be occasionally quite funny
A space film set aboard a NASA space mission as two stranded astronauts debate whether to surrender to mutual attraction. In contrast to realistically grounded efforts such as Gravity, The Martian et al, this is a comedy
Claymation film from Aardman Animations that is in effect a prehistoric comedy like The Flintstones or The Croods mixed up with a sports film, but is Aardman’s slightest work so far
A collection of Michael Jackson short pieces, leading up to the 25 minute Smooth Criminal segment where he transforms into a godlike being. Fascinating in its bizarreness, largely a Michael Jackson ego trip
From Troma films, this is an anthology made up of twelve Christmas-themed short horror films for what supposed leading indie directors – so acclaimed I’ve only heard of two of them before
A heist film that ends up in a mansion filled with grown-men who have diaper fetishes. And then things get really bizarre. Some films are so wild and insane they attain cult status. And then there are the wannabes