Filmmakers help three children to realize their imaginary fairy tale characters; one is a giant clown with a child’s head.
Tag Archives: Documentary
CAPSULE: PALMS (1993)
Ладони, AKA Ladoni
DIRECTED BY: Artour Aristakisyan
PLOT: A man tries to connect with his unborn son by seeing glimpses of him in the faces of people he meets in the slums of late-Soviet Moldova.
COMMENTS: Palms is a pseudo-documentary black-and-white film shot single-handedly by Artour Aristakisyan over five years in Chisinau, Moldova. It is a haunting journey through faith, identity, and what it means to exist. When it was first screened in Moscow in the early 1990s, it blindsided everyone. Few people saw it, but those who did will never forget it. Even compared to other eccentric Russian films of Soviet parallel cinema or necrorealism, Palms is something else entirely. But unlike the ironic works of Yevgeny Yufit or Andrei I., Palms overflows with intense passion and austere ideology.
The film is composed of ten short stories about real people—beggars, psychiatric patients, oddballs, cripples, and others—who behave like “Bodies without Organs” (a concept from philosopher Gilles Deleuze). So, who are these people? There’s an unwashed woman who has supposedly lain on the ground for 40 years, waiting for Jesus. A boy who swore not to move until the Kingdom of Heaven arrives. An old woman who clings to the severed head of an SS officer—her lover—a clear nod to both Salome and Judith. A grandfather who collects trash from the dead, with “the border of Israel running across his face.” A man named Srulik, who kisses a dove—an allusion to the Holy Spirit.
Each kooky character, with their own tragic story, is woven into a cryptic narrative voiced by the filmmaker, who speaks as “the Father” addressing his “Unborn Son,” a child about to be aborted (an allusion to “the Logos” —Jesus before the Incarnation). The Father (voiced by Aristakisyan himself) is the only speaking character in the film. The central theme of his calm, solemn narration is a deep distrust of the material world, which is portrayed as inherently evil. Earth, in this worldview, is the creation of the Demiurge—a false god behind all societal systems. Although Aristakisyan claims he followed these drifters, outcasts, and madmen for five years and wrote down what they said, it’s clear that many of them are figments of his imagination.
Though the film seems disconnected from any specific cinematic tradition, Palms shares thematic affinities with early Christian thought, including Pauline theology and the Bogomil heresy. “Father Aristakisyan” proclaims:
“This is the System. It doesn’t have borders anymore. The System will find you wherever you go. So, kid, before it’s too late, focus on your salvation. You have your own light. Use it, and you’ll escape the System. For now, don’t get distracted by all this nonsense. No, don’t think about traveling abroad. After death, you’ll have plenty of time to travel. Your next baptism will be by fire. And then it’ll be too late to pick a side.”
To the Paulicians, everything on Earth was the work of Sataniel—the Demiurge, the god of the Old Testament. Jesus Christ, in contrast, was the Good God, made of “subtle” matter. They viewed Christ as a kind of phantom, not truly human—an idea known as docetism, associated with Serapion of Antioch. Aristakisyan’s concept of the System aligns with this Paulician worldview: not merely a political structure, but something much larger. It’s not socialism or capitalism, or even human society as such. The System is the entire material realm—factories, asylums, homes, and everything else.
Ironically, Aristakisyan (or his on-screen persona) even ridicules the vastness of outer space:
“I’m worried about you, kid. The sky used to be a protective ceiling—obviously made of foil. It kept me safe from the cosmos and all the crap in it. When I lived under the sky, maybe some of my thoughts didn’t come true. Now, every thought becomes real. It’s like cancer spreading everywhere, but a special kind of cancer. It keeps the body alive so the corpse can keep generating energy.”
In a nod to earlier critiques of modernity, the film hits the audience with an almost didactic intensity. Aristakisyan’s vision of the System is a heady mix of conspiracy theory and mystical philosophy, creating a spellbinding and unsettling atmosphere throughout. Thirty years later, the leading ideologist of Russian fascism, Alexander Dugin, would echo some of these themes: “The Outer Space exploration is godless and shameful. It’s a globalist fantasy preparing for the Antichrist. The Outer Space is an illusion. We need to stay faithful to Christ and the Russian land.”
The film recalls the small, priestless sects that emerged in 18th-century Russia, some of which still survive in remote regions like the Evenk taiga or the Trans-Volga steppes. One such group, the Golbeshniki, believed society itself was the kingdom of Lucifer. They buried themselves in mysterious earthen dens, burned their children in dark rites, and danced naked in the moonlight.
Despite its Paulician creed and somber tale, the film breathes of something far greater. The pallid and dappled hues that stain the frame, the wretched hovels of Chișinău, and the tranquil voice of the author together weave a spell most strange. A beauty not of this earth steals o’er the senses, ensnaring the soul in such wise that to look away becomes a sorrowful task indeed.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
CAPSULE: INVENTION (2024)
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DIRECTED BY: Courtney Stephens
FEATURING: Callie Hernandez, Sahm McGlynn, James N. Kienitz Wilkins
PLOT: Actress Callie Hernandez comes to terms with her eccentric father’s death, while portraying the character Carrie Fernandez who inherits her father’s patent for an “electromagnetic healing device.”
COMMENTS: Brought to our attention by a reader who noticed some uncanny similarities to Certified Weird curiosity After Last Season, Invention tells a story of death and medical experimentation. Both films are low-budget explorations of weird science, but the comparison ends there—in Invention‘s favor, as the more coherent and watchable film (although After Last Season earns the award for weirdness).
In real life, actor-writer Hernandez is the daughter of Dr. John Hernandez, an alternative medical guru who hosted a program on local television. Six months after his death, Hernandez began collaborating with director Stephens on a script inspired by her mourning experiences. Actual footage from her father’s VHS archives made its way into the film. The story becomes a dual narrative about Hernandez and her fictional counterpart, “Carrie Fernandez,” the daughter of elusive “Dr. J.” When she unexpectedly inherits a patent discovers upon his death, she discovers her father secretly invented a “vibronic” machine.
Dr. J’s story is reminiscent of Wilhelm Reich, another traditionally educated medical professional whose career took a strange turn when he began developing outré theories (whom readers may recall from the Certified Weird film WR: Mysteries of the Organism). Dr. J’s device isn’t sexual, but Carrie finds out the FDA recalled it for its dubious medical value.
People of a certain age will remember seeing television personalities like Dr. J on public access, programs that were a bewildering mix of actual facts, bizarre theories, and advertising for various New Age products and therapies. I distinctly remember flipping past these types of shows on PBS back in the 1980s and ’90s (to a kid, they were incredibly boring). I can only imagine what it must have been like growing up with someone like Dr J for a father. Invention gives the viewer a pretty good idea, though the film mostly focuses on the absurdities of dealing with the loss of a parent in a death-phobic country like the United States.
Invention excels at black humor, maintaining a consistent tone of deadpan awkwardness as Callie/Carrie endures stilted conversations with funeral parlor staff and estate executors, while navigating the Kafkaesque bureaucracy of corporate bereavement policies. As Callie encounters the various people connected to her father’s mysterious machine, she tries to learn more about it, but conflicting stories emerge. Some of Dr J’s friends and patients remain convinced of his misunderstood genius; others politely refrain from calling him a crackpot to his grieving daughter.
Brief scenes of intensely colored video and animation emphasize Carrie’s descent into this psychedelically-tinged world of alternative medicine, as does a tea party in an “Alice in Wonderland”-themed corn maze. The intertwined narratives of Callie and Carrie, united by archival television footage, blur the boundaries between fiction and reality, as Dr. Hernandez essentially plays himself in both. But aside from the animated sequences, the film’s style remains realist. It hovers at the edge of the rabbit hole without ever tumbling in.
Many viewers will probably leave this film wanting to know more about the mysterious machine, but it remains cryptic. A series of cathode-ray tubes connected by a ring of coiled wire and staged in a red-walled room, it looks suitably science-fictional, and its main champions are a little too “woo” to be believed. Callie references Nikola Tesla’s theories when trying to defend to father’s vision, but she doesn’t seem entirely convinced. Even after she begins using the machine, she never reveals whatever effect it may or may not be having on her.
Hernandez looked familiar to me, but I couldn’t remember what else I had seen her in—probably because she was buried under layers of mascara in Under the Silver Lake (as Millicent Sevence, another daughter in mourning for her eccentric father). She also co-starred in Benson and Moorhead’s The Endless. Which is to say, Hernandez has some fledgling weird credentials. Courtney Stephens has been assistant director on a number of Terrence Malick pictures. I’ll be curious to see how both their careers develop. Invention has weird potential; perhaps someday we’ll see something full blown weird from its creators.
Invention is currently playing in limited cities across North America, with a wider release planned for Summer 2025.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
(This movie was nominated for review by Morgan, who suggested “If After Last Season left an impact on anyone, it would probably have to be Courtney Stephens and her film Invention from 2024. The trailer is a pretty strong homage: minimalist keyboard music, cardboard in the background, CGI dreams, questions that go nowhere, and shot on film.” Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)
IT CAME FROM THE READER-SUGGESTED QUEUE: THE HANDS OF GOD (2003)
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DIRECTED BY: Alyson Levy
PLOT: Participants at the 9th Annual International Festival of Christian Puppetry and Ventriloquism in Kankakee, Illinois explain the role of puppets in their evangelism and their faith.
COMMENTS: I will never forget the jaw-dropping moment some years back when a late evening spin ‘round the dial landed me on public access television just in time for one of the most bizarre sights that had ever flickered across my retinas. It was a green space alien puppet singing in a warbling baritone about the power of Jesus, while random intro-level chroma-key wipes revealed an assortment of inanimate puppets waiting for their turn in the spotlight alongside the barely animate human hosts staring blankly into the distance. I had stumbled upon Mr. Grey Spaceman, one of the stars of the legendary “Junior Christian Science Bible Lesson Hour,” a kind of kids’ show for kids who had been raised in a cave and then fed quaaludes before being plopped in front of the TV set. The inexplicable mind behind this entertainment (that ran for over two decades) was David Liebe Hart, who built and operated all the puppets in the show, using the same voice for all of them and singing in unthinkable lugubrious tones. Hart’s was a talent so singular that Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim invited him onto their “Awesome Show” to just be himself.
There is nothing quite as weird as Hart’s material in The Hands of God. (There is probably nothing as weird as Hart’s material in the world.) But there’s a spirit that runs through the “Junior Christian Science Bible Lesson Hour” that is present here, an earnestness to spread the word of the Gospel and an innate certainty that the best way to do so is through sub-Henson puppetry. The Lord works in mysterious ways, and this is certainly among the most impenetrable of His mysteries.
Director Levy is part of the PFFR collective, the folks responsible for the outrageous children’s-TV parody “Wonder Showzen” as well as the scripts for the twisted anthology Final Flesh. So it’s natural to assume that her goal is to exploit these guileless rubes for all they’re worth. And that may be, but having arrived at this week-long gathering of devout felt, she clearly realized that nothing she did could be more remarkable than what these performers were willing to do themselves. Aside from pointing the camera at the stage, Levy is careful to let the action speak for itself.
One of the things the action says very loudly is that the message is vastly more important than the medium. The puppeteers are uniformly terrible performers, so dedicated to reminding us that Jesus died for our sins that they never come within a country mile of the rhythm or wit we expect from a comedic sketch. One puppet duo consists of an old man in overalls and a primly dressed little girl, but the characters are irrelevant because they’re only here to trade Christian aphorisms that they already know, echoing the way they themselves are performing for an audience that has already been converted to the Good Word. When there is a message, it’s usually a reminder of the flawed world we all share. One puppet troupe dances in front of signs reading “Oprah No” and “Jesus Yes.” Four puppets wrapped in keffiyehs slam into each other in an orgy of Muppety violence until they are thrust apart by the arrival of a puppet Jesus. Most cringe-inducing is the sweet-looking woman whose hippie-girl puppet Yolanda is just back from Mexico, where she “never knew it would be so poor.” Certainly they mean well, but absolutely no one is concerned how they will come across. The Lord is on their side.
An interesting storyline in The Hands of God is the connection between the puppeteers and their puppets. In interview segments, when the subjects are explaining their understanding of the functionality of faith, the humans frequently turn to seek approval from the very figures they are controlling. The puppets authentically become independent personalities, separate in character but fully aligned in mindset. Perhaps the most insightful moment comes during the closing credits, when the interviewees attempt to answer the question of whether there are puppets in heaven. For the first time in the picture, there is a schism in the dogma, as the absolutists who reject any physical manifestation in the Great Beyond run up against those who are clearly heartbroken at the mere thought of being without their companions for eternity.
The Hands of God is proof that weirdness is in the eye of the beholder, as the behavior of these righteous performers can be interpreted as either wildly psychotic or charmingly quirky. But like their spiritual ancestor David Liebe Hart, no one here is doing a bit. Levy’s short documentary is a fascinating look at a group of people for whom touching the face of God is as easy as talking to the hand.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
OTHER LINKS OF INTEREST:
Depraved Puppetry: Is There Any Good News in Dark Humor? – A perspective from a Christian who’s also a fan of PFFR
(This movie was nominated for review by Brad. Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)
CAPSULE: PIECE BY PIECE (2024)
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DIRECTED BY: Morgan Neville
FEATURING: Voice of Pharrell Williams
PLOT: An autobiographical documentary about hip-hop producer/musician Pharrell Williams, with all interviews and dramatizations recreated in Lego animation.
COMMENTS: Pharrel Williams, of course, is well-known as the composer and producer of such hits as… um… well, I confess I can’t actually remember any of the titles. With his band/production unit the Neptunes, Pharrel has worked with a lot of other performers whose names I’ve heard but whose tunes I can’t hum: Kendrick Lamar, Gwen Stefani and No Doubt, Jay-Z, Justin Timberlake. He primarily produces and sells “beats” (as an old fogey, I still haven’t adjusted to the fact that “beats” have replaced “songs” as the primary unit of pop music). All of them have the quality of being “catchy”: i.e., unique enough to tickle your ear, but generic enough to feel familiar and comfortable.
I write the above not to praise my own snobbishness or to disparage Williams’ art. He’s clearly an accomplished pop craftsman, but his musical style just isn’t my thing. But the remarkable thing is that, by telling what otherwise would be a self-serving, by-the-book musical biodoc about a subject I don’t care about through the unexpected format of Lego animation, Williams captured my attention. It’s a gimmick, but it works: not only is it visually (and even synesthesially) interesting, but there is just enough resonance between Lego blocks and the modularity of the creative process to make for an apt metaphor.
It is, of course, amusing to see scenes like Lego Pharrell Williams meeting Lego Snoop Dogg. A plastic box labeled “PG Spray” puts a smile on everyone’s face during their audience, which embodies the carefree, child-friendly approach to Williams’ story. The film never loses its optimism that everything will always work out for Pharrell (and, it suggests, for anyone else who adopts his gee-whiz, gung-ho workaholism). But, in between the cute cubist celebrity cameos lie more ambitiously animated sequences. The Lego visuals, supplemented by digitally-applied neon, demonstrate more grandeur than expected. The tone is set in an early dream scene where a blocky yellow Triton knights young Pharrell in his undersea kingdom. It’s best exemplified by a bravura sequence where the musician explains his childhood synesthasia: he sits before speakers blaring a Stevie Wonder LP, which draw him into a trippy world where sound becomes “beautiful cubes of light cascading” over his blissed out Lego features. Pharrell’s commercial beats are depicted throughout as bouncing blocks arranged in novel geometric patterns with blinking lights attached. There also are singing whales, and a trip into space where Carl Sagan delivers cosmic wisdom. Piece by Piece may not be completely accurate, or provide much practical insight into the creative process, but it accurately conveys the ecstasy of inspiration that keeps artists slaving away at their craft. Like any mega-celebrity, Williams is primarily a marketer, devoting more care to the sizzle than to the steak. And this is great sizzle.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
(This movie was nominated for review by “Anonymous,” who correctly noted “most of the weirdness is solely in the visuals, in a Fantasia sort of sense.” Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)
