Before he broke through with the animated features Coraline and The Nightmare Before Christmas, Henry Selick was doing eye-popping work for television commercials and MTV station IDs.
He put together an imaginative mix of animation techniques as the pilot episode for a proposed series on MTV. Unfortunately, the network didn’t go ahead with the show, but did end up airing this fantastic short as part of their animation showcase Liquid Television. And it's scored by The Residents!
This is a high-concept sci-fi idea in the service of several hyper-kinetic action sequences. It's John Wick with a cyborg twist. It's as if Luc Besson tackled an episode of "Black Mirror." It's ridiculous, and it's an unapologetically entertaining 96-minute thrill ride. The bio-tech gimmicks are given more layers than any of the characters, but Logan Marshall-Green does an entirely adequate job as a store-brand version of Tom Hardy. Recommended if you liked Lucy, Gamer, or Hardcore Henry.
One of those rare shorts that still surprises me with each subsequent viewing. I love how the titular soundtrack piece never speeds up or intensifies, even as the stream of people shuffling in and out builds to a choreographed chaos that’s just a wonder to watch. If you liked this, check out Cycles, Copy Shop, or Hertzfeldt's The Meaning of Life.
The vintage children’s book style of this unusual and highly entertaining short was inspired by several sheets of educational stickers from the 1950s that director Run Wrake found in a thrift store. While the retro imagery might bring to mind the graphic design of artists like Winston Smith and Frank Kozik, this dark morality tale is able to fully explore the sinister motives of Dick and Jane that are only hinted at in the print work of Kozik or Smith. It’s terrific stuff.
