Over thirty years ago, “Mad God” was first put into production. Phil Tippett put it on hold before picking up where he left off in the early 2010s and completing it in 2021 with funding from Kickstarter. It’s a movie that took decades to develop, yet it only justifies its lengthy production in the first five minutes. Mad God is a nightmare that comes to life, full of intricate stop-motion scenes and positively gruesome visuals. It continuously confronts us with its numerous horrors in what turns into a surrealistic fever dream, and the creatures in it can individually act as the main adversary of a horror franchise. Mad God, a visionary piece, excels as a sensory experience and doesn’t appear overly concerned with the plot. However, because of the overt influence of religion and politics, it has the quality of a riddle that, when solved, may be highly satisfying.
The plot of Mad God:
The assassin, a tall man, covered in a jacket and gas mask, enters a horrible, destroyed planet by a diving bell. The assassin has luggage and a map in his possession.
The assassin encounters numerous creatures as they journey through the underworld, many of whom are ruthlessly preyed upon by larger monsters. He eventually arrives in a city where a faceless drone army appears to be under the command of a creature with scorched flesh and filthy teeth that communicates in baby babbling. The assassin finds a mountain of suitcases that resemble his own deep within the city. The assassin inserts the timed bomb in his bag and prepares to detonate it after opening it. The ticking hand of the bomb seems unable to complete its circuit of the clock, and he is attacked and dragged away by a crawling monster that he was unaware was behind him.
In front of a large audience, the assassin is stripped and chained to a table. A surgeon and a nurse enter the room, cut open the assassin’s abdomen, and start poking around in his chest cavities. Pulling out objects and papers, they are then flung on the ground. The surgeon succeeds in his mission and discovers an odd, crying newborn creature. The nurse receives it from the surgeon and takes it with her.
The assassin’s brain is hooked up to a television by the surgeon after drilling a hole in his skull. The globe above is depicted on the television as the surgeon observes. The final man delivers an assassin a map made by twisted witches and sends him down in a diving bell. The assassin follows the map through a munitions depot, a graveyard, and a battle zone before descending a spiral road in a motorcycle and, finally, a jeep.
The nurse returns to the underworld and delivers the baby to a hovering ghostly being, which leads the child to an alchemist’s den. The alchemist turns the newborn into liquid, later turning its remains into gold. Then, using this gold, a new universe is produced, going through the same processes of development, civilisation, and self-destruction as the first. The clock in the assassin’s bomb seems to restart and finish its circuit.
Release Date:
At the 74th Locarno Film Festival in 2021, Mad God had its world premiere. The movie’s distribution rights were obtained by Shudder, who intends to release it in cinemas and on AMC+ for a short time on June 16, 2022.
Hi! Saheli Banerji is a writer and novelist who has been featured on a variety of platforms for her distinct way of depicting real-life stories as well as the exotic and supernatural creatures of the earth. She likes to write poetry and sketch cartoons. You can contact her on LinkedIn. You can also follow her on https://xngrilaproductions.com