Much like
My Winnipeg and
Cowards Bend The Knee,
Brand Upon The Brain serves as a personal journal for Guy Maddin. On one level we’re watching him work out some unresolved childhood traumas. The basic premise of the film concerns a young man (“Guy”) returning to the orphanage he was raised in to confront his past. On another level,
Brand Upon The Brain is another Guy Maddin cinematic collage in the vein of something like
Pulp Fiction where he proudly and openly wears his cinematic influences on his sleeve.
As much as I love this movie, there isn’t much to say about it that hasn’t already been said in previous posts (click
here &
here to my thoughts on
My Winnipeg and
Cowards Bend The Knee). I’m just using this post as an excuse to share all the cinematic comparisons I’ve made that have been wasted on twitter over the years (I’m permanently shadowbanned so almost no one sees what I tweet anymore).
It makes sense that Maddin is so heavily influenced by David Lynch (
click here to read more). If you watch Lynch’s early short films you can see a lot of premature ideas that would eventually turn in to features like
Eraserhead,
Lost Highway and
Inland Empire. The same applies to Guy Maddin. Maddin will make a short film but will still cut & paste the same shots or lines of dialogue in to his features. Lynch revisits a lot of same territory over and over from a slightly different perspective.
Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive and
Inland Empire are almost the same thing with different actors and slightly different approaches. Lynch has gone back in to the
Twin Peaks universe multiple times over the last 30 years and the protagonist in
The Grandmother looks quite similar to Robert Blake’s mystery man in
Lost Highway.
 |
The Grandmother / Lost Highway
|
Maddin is always referencing his childhood (
My Winnipeg &
Brand Upon The Brain), his loyalty to Canada (
Cowards Bend The Knee and
Saddest Music In The World), his not-so hidden sexual perversions and his love of David Lynch.
he [David Lynch] is kind of doing what painting has been doing for years, and I’m not saying that his images are painterly, but that he is doing with narrative what painting does - Guy Maddin, ScreenAnarchy.com
 |
The Passion Of Joan Of Arc / Brand Upon The Brain
|
|
 |
L'age D'or /
Brand Upon The Brain
|
|
my first inclination was to kind of remake Fellini’s I VITELLONI - Guy Maddin, Slant Magazine
 |
| I Vitelloni / Brand Upon The Brain |
I watch a movie and I pretend Luis Buñuel is sitting beside me - Guy Maddin, TheAVClub.com
 |
| The Criminal Life Of Archibald de la Cruz / Brand Upon The Brain |
|
 |
Un Chien Andalou / Brand Upon The Brain
|
 |
Mexican Bus Ride / Brand Upon The Brain
|
|
 |
The Criminal Life Of Archibald de la Cruz / Brand Upon The Brain
|
I feel kind of Buñuelian - Guy Maddin, Offscreen.com
 |
The Criminal Life Of Archibald de la Cruz /
Brand Upon The Brain
|
 |
Un Chien Andalou /
Brand Upon The Brain
|
|
I love Murnau more than anything - Guy Maddin, The Columbia Journal
 |
The Haunted Castle / Brand Upon The Brain
|
|
Brand Upon The Brain is most definitely not an intro or even a mid-level Guy Maddin film. It's jumpy, chaotic, silent and intentionally schizophrenic. If you can make it through stuff like Saddest Music In The World or My Winnipeg, then this should be the next level.
