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Rakvickarna More at IMDbPro »

20 out of 20 people found the following review useful:
A delightfully subversive satire of greed and war., 31 October 2004
Author: DanSTC from San Diego, CA

Punch & Judy is Svankmajer's third film effort, and a triumph of surrealist satire. Whereas his two previous films had been too strange for their own good, this third film stands as a strong testament to Svakmajer's blossoming ability as a filmmaker.

The opening sequence is an important element to the film, showing a clockwork band of creepy-looking toy monkeys who seem to set the tone for the goofy animalistic black comedy that is about to unfold. Contrasted by this clockwork band of misfits are metallic clockwork contraptions of working-class families (covered with rust and paint chips) in a psychotic drone of mechanical repetition. After this, a "swinging ship" carousal sways back and forth to swaying images of decadent childish cherubs. Finally, a series of frightening carousal horses drone by the camera and after a collision-edited sequence of wooden horses, we are presented with a puppet stage.

From there, the story unfolds; the film features two puppets, Punch and Jody (mistitled as "Judy" - Jody has always been a male counterpart to Punch in his puppet plays, even though Punch does has a wife named Judy) who become involved in an escalating war with large mallets over a botched attempt to barter over a fine guinea pig. The sequences that follow feature bizarre imagery and seemingly nonsequitor clips and closeups (some animated) of archival newsprint.

During the entire conflict in which either side attempts to see the other dead and buried (and fails) while the guinea pig remains oblivious and indifferent towards either side. Thus the animal represents the arbitrary notion of property with regards to man's environment.

Eventually Punch & Jody slay one another after wreaking miserable havoc on the landscape of the stage around them (even passing over the mechanical contraptions and carousel horses featured in the opening sequence) and collapsing together into the coffin they had intended to bury each other in.

The puppeteer's hands slide out of the puppets, the coffin lid closes, and the unaffected guinea pig crawls through the open mouth of one of the wall paintaing.

The film itself is, among other things, a subervise satire of humanity - particularly our attitudes with regards to conflict. This film was made during the cold war, and made comedy of the capitalist versus communist ideals. (This subtle is further reinforced by the fact that Punch is dressed in red and demands a fairer share of money than Jody offers, while Jody lives in a house lined with newspapers and attempts to set the price for the guinea pig himself.) The film in a way, mocks the mechanized hypocrisy of communism, and the greedy inclinations of capitalism. Even so, drawing up a cold war allegory would be a disservice to the film, which symbollically mocks the human condition, and our never-ending always-escalating desire for conflict which results in our own mutual self-destruction. Meanwhile, nature being indifferent to our struggles, goes on without us.

This film is without a doubt, a masterpiece of surrealist and czechoslovakian cinema - if you enjoy it, I would recommend any of Svankmajer's other works, particularly his full-length films "Conspirators of Pleasure" "Alice" "Faust" and "Little Otik." His successive work (including his countless other short films, many of which are genius, particularly "Jabberwocky" "Ossuary" "Food" "Darkness-Light-Darkness" and "Dimensions of Dialogue") has only built upon the foundation created by this classic gem of a short film.

And you thought the stage-show was violent..., 10 February 2010

Author: Polaris_DiB from United States

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Gosh, I think this is the best Jan Svankmajer short I've seen yet. It is bewilderingly hysteric, hilariously slapstick, and disturbingly violent all at once. Svankmajer also mixes many different forms of animation fluently and breathlessly, providing an age-old story (well, this isn't strictly Punch and Judy, but the format is) with a cinematic adaptation that provides it space and movement outside of the capabilities of real life puppeteering.

After a carnival-like opening (leading possibly into the Carnivalesque nature of the show) of monkeys playing music, a puppet brings a live guinea pig onto the stage and starts feeding him. Another puppet, fatter, wants the guinea pig, and tries to buy it off of the first. The two cannot agree on a price, so the fight begins--to terrible but amazingly funny results.

Every detail of this short is amazing. The pictures of women, death, weapons, and religious symbols pasted on the cardboard cut-out reality, the movement of both the story and the figures, the various forms of animation leading into others, the sense of the puppets being watched by more than just the audience, and the moment when the puppets start breaking down and falling apart as a result of their own violence are all awe-inspiring. The ending, where the puppets die in a coffin together and the hands disappear under a destroyed staging, reveals a sort of fatalism not immediately apparent in the rest of the show. The movie itself is incredibly dark, but you'll find yourself giggling through all of it.

--PolarisDiB

2 out of 5 people found the following review useful:
Punch in the Eye, 27 October 2002
Author: tedg (tedg@FilmsFolded.com) from Virginia Beach

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Spoilers herein.

One gets the impression that all his little shorts are practice, projects that test different effects. This is his first experiment in understanding the rhythm of the camera. Its only of interest if you are working up to an understanding of his `Alice' or `Jabberwocky.'

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 4: Has some interesting elements.

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