Presented at the Venice Mostra, Playing God Didn't leave us any marble. In this fantastic short film by Matteo Burani, the Italian artist plunges us into a gloomy universe, a workshop where a creature mingled in clay comes to life. Nine intense minutes and a real tour de force for any stop-motion enthusiast.
You're dust...
In recent years, stop-motion works never cease to surprise us by pushing the technical limits until they create the illusion of dreamlike worlds, sometimes nightmares. Self-taught acts like Takahide Hori (Junkhead), pioneers like Phil Tippett (Mad God) or artists tortured like Robert Morgan to whom one probably owes the most glaucous shorts ever realized (Bobby Yeah, Tomorrow I Will Be Dirt, etc..). Even Guillermo Del Toro got caught up in stop-motion by offering his own reading of Pinocchio. No doubt with Playing God, The puppeteer Matteo Burani seeks to register in the courtyard of the greats. Playing God is a co-production of the studio Chroma and the production house Around Midnight to whom we already owe many unusual and excellent shorts Unicorn Wars (see our review and interview Here).
« We slowly move big things » as announced on the first page of the Chroma site and difficult to claim otherwise as this technique requires a thoroughness that confines itself to asceticism. What an amazing demonstration when we witness as if by magic (black) the birth of this little man, shaped in clay and pain before our eyes. Absolutely striking, this sequence is supported by a sound design disturbing, a clever photograph and a disturbed imagination that Goya would not deny. The illusion is perfect. Taken from terror in the face of the emergence of its evanescent consciousness, the face torn by emotions, the creature seems naturally alive.
... And you will return to the dust
Giving life from clay is a well-known theme of both mythology and literature. We think immediately of Constantine Hansen's painting, Prometheus creating man from clay, a representation of the creation echoed in the famous poem Metamorphosis - Ovid. « Thus the matter, previously informed and sterile, took the figure of man, until then unknown to the universe » tells the Latin poet before prophesying the golden age.
There are so many variations in Egyptian mythology with the god Khnoum who creates human children from the clay before placing them in their mother's womb; in Hindus with Parvati, who conceived Ganesh by transforming clay into flesh and bone; in Genesis again when « The Eternal God made man of the dust of the earth ». And we could continue this list forever.
Old theme as the world, in the era of modernity and broken dreams, the myth of the original creation quickly shifts to that of Frankenstein. This is the case when our creature sees light for the first time. In the midst of its congeners with broken mouths, the newborn slices by its perfection. Unless this one's only ephemeral? Let's hope now that the film will travel through the festivals to meet its audience. He would have all his place in Foreign or FEFFS September.
Trailer of Playing God
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