NEW YORK, NY.- Film Forum presents the US theatrical premiere of The Quay Brothers’ Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass on Friday, August 29.
The first feature in 20 years by animation masters The Quay Brothers is inspired by the writings of Polish author Bruno Schulz. In a mixture of live action and breathtakingly intricate stop-motion puppetry, the Quays follow the journey of Josef, who arrives at a labyrinthine sanatorium in search of his dying father. Told in seven chapters corresponding with seven prophetic, mystical viewing lenses, the film bends objects, time, and dimensions as Josef navigates the realm between dreams and reality.
The film had its world premiere at the 2024 Venice Film Festival and was featured at the BFI London Film Festival, International Film Festival Rotterdam, and more.
American identical twins living in London, stop motion animators Stephen and Timothy Quay (born 1947 in Norristown, Pennsylvania) find their inspiration in Eastern European literature and classical music and art, their work distinguished by its dark humor and an uncanny feeling for color and texture. Masters of miniaturization, they turn their tiny sets into unforgettable worlds suggestive of long-repressed childhood dreams.
In conjunction with this opening: THE QUAY BROTHERS — ON 35mm, a program of three Quay Brothers classic shorts in 35mm, curated by Christopher Nolan, as well as Nolan's short documentary, Quay, will play on Wednesday, August 27 at 7:00 PM. (This program was first presented at Film Forum in 2016.)
These three Quay masterworks feature broken pencils and lead shavings in In Abstentia (2000; “a dazzling piece of work” – The Guardian); a porcelain doll's explorations of a dreamer's imagination in The Comb (1991; “most beautiful of their recent films” – The New Yorker); and the nightmarish netherworld of Street of Crocodiles (1986; “their crowning achievement” – Film Comment). Quay (2015; “delightful and mischievous” – The Village Voice), Nolan's short film, reveals the inner workings of the Quays' studio.
“[A] surreal stop-motion fantasia…[a] dark, densely nested fairytale of life, death and what comes in between…with entirely its own collapsing, free-form model of storytelling.” – Guy Lodge, Variety
“A transporting, ghostly affair. Wonderfully strange and beguiling. An enchanting fantasia. The Quay Brothers’ trademark stop-motion animation is as haunting as ever.” – Tim Grierson, Screen Daily
“Timothy and Stephen Quay have developed an entirely unique style in the world of stop-motion animation: vigorously kinetic yet meticulously controlled; balletic in its interweaving of aural and visual rhythms; full of the sort of trivia and esoterica that fascinated Borges and Pessoa; and given to looped sequences of pure, sensual, cinematographic abstraction.” – Olivia Weir, The Film Stage
“As with all [of the Quay Brothers’] work, this is genuinely oneiric cinema, reminiscent of early Maddin, or late Lynch… An exploration of a psyche through dream and memory.” – Theo Rollason, In Review
