Manly Games

"Manly games" is a combination of live action, very creative claymation, and a sport documentary. It stars when thousands of men of different ages and social standing arrive to the stadium to watch a soccer game. Then we see a man who is going to enjoy the game watching it on TV in his apartment where the fridge in the kitchen is filled with beer bottles. When the game begins, we realize that the rules of the game have been changed: the points seem to come from the team who kill more of the other team's players. The funniest and most shocking scenes demonstrate the amazing skills and imagination with which the players of one team dispose or their opponents. I've always thought that there is no creature in the world that has developed the ability in torturing, mutilating, and murdering its own species with such creativity and delight as humans do and Svankmajer proved me right.

Jan Svankmajer's stop-motion films are ultra-bizarre and often creepy. Some of them are also pretty funny--and "The Male Game" is also a tad creepy.

The film stars the same actor in every role. He plays a guy at home watching a soccer game, the players on the field AND the referee. However, this game ain't normal in any sense! The players often are giant cutouts that move about using stop-motion. And, in closeups, they are clay. Why the closeups? Because the game features a unique way to score--by ripping the opponents' faces apart! Scissors, a child's train, bottles--anything goes as the clay faces are torn to pieces! It's all very surreal as well as a wonderful commentary about the brutality of the sport and the fans. Weird but very enjoyable and the stop-motion was done quite well--as you'd expect from Svankmajer. Not his best, but quite good.

Svankmajer is a god! Really funny animation, a wonderful critic against soccer and supporters. See it! You will laugh a lot

Mixing live action scenes with a quite original (and brutal dark comedy) animation and smart edition with football pictures, this is an acidic Czech film that makes fun with the recurrent brutality in that sport and the way men deal with it. Also the ritual of supporting, drinking beer, eating anything, appears in this innovative film. Not only it worth for the competent animation but also for the gags.

I have been scouring imdb trying to find the three movies I saw of Svankmajer's. They were all perfect. I think this one was the third best of the three I saw, but that's hardly a bad thing since they were all masterpieces. This one, about a man watching soccer and drinking, is really crazy and wonderful. If you can find anything by this animator, rent it or buy it! He's marvelous!