AWN’s latest short film survey remembers the raw, minimalist, and ferociously satirical work of the legendary indie filmmaker, who passed away this July.
This month we take a moment to remember the legendary filmmaker, Phil Mulloy, who passed away in July.Mulloy’s films are raw, minimalist, and ferociously satirical — short bursts of crude brilliance that confront the hypocrisies of religion, nationalism, masculinity, and class with uncompromising rage.
If Disney represents the heart of animation, then Mulloy is its bowels —unafraid to reveal the grotesque underbelly of human nature.With thick black lines, stick figures, and penis-nosed characters, Mulloy’s deceptively primitive style delivers scathing critiques of modern society.He broke onto the scene in the 1990s with the blistering series, followed by subversive classics like and .
In the 2000s, he pushed further with the sci-fi-influenced trilogy and the deeply polarizing yet groundbreaking feature and short series .(1991) The series consists of six three-minute films: , , , , , and .My initial impression was that the series condemned the U.S.
— and all its violent, arrogant, greedy bluster.Although Mulloy was clearly influenced by his love of cowboy movies, the series was really a critique of the absurdity of masculinity.“I used to watch cowboy films as a kid,” Mulloy recalled.
“It just seemed like a world of men.It had a lot to do with the women’s movement bringing certain things to the forefront.Cowboys are obviously an American thing, but the films weren’t just about the U.S.
It was more about guys in general — how they behave when they get together.They can be pretty obnoxious.” (2013) Mr.Christie is wearing a Mayan mask and won’t explain why.
Turns out he’s joined a Mayan end-of-the-world cult, invited by Sir Jumblesworthy.The rest of the family is jealous.Terry is impressed.
Mrs.Christie tries on a mask — even though it’s a men’s-only club.Terry and Tracy make their own.
It quickly spirals into a cycle of swearing and name-calling.It only ends when Buster attacks a stick figure from a Men’s Only bathroom sign and bites off its penis… or maybe it was Mr.Christie? As Buster holds the severed penis in his mouth, an unseen voice whispers that it’s not the end of the world — it could be a new beginning.
It’s classic Mulloy — where no horror is too deep to be twisted into a gag, and no gag too ridiculous to be haunted by something darker.(1995) Perhaps inspired by the dark and satirical ads, is a twisted nod to cinema.It also recalls Robin Steele’s animations from the same era, in which Steele used stick figures to reenact famous movie scenes while retaining the original soundtracks.
As expected, Mulloy takes a different approach.In these 30-second segments, he delivers a surreal homage to films like , , , (which features a man sailing a toy boat in his toilet before dunking his own head in), , and .(2000-2004) comically and savagely explores the cyclical stupidity of humanity.
It’s no coincidence that the epigraph “Mirror, Mirror on the wall.” opens The trilogy, and certainly most of Mulloy’s films, grab a mirror and jam it into our faces, forcing us to ask some awkward questions about our society, beliefs and choices.The fact that Mulloy’s films regularly polarize audiences is apt… the very people offended by the “zog’s” habits in mirror those in Mulloy’s audience who are offended by his blunt depictions of the society’s hypocrisies and, well, idiocies.In some ways, the trilogy (the title is a nod to the 1916 silent film epic by the racially problematic director, D.W.
Griffith) acts as a compendium of earlier works like , , , and , as Mulloy dives head (or dick?) first into racism, xenophobia, nationalism, misinformation, cult of celebrity, gender, and sexuality — with his signature sharp edge.Mulloy masterfully shifts between crude humor — packed with dick and sex jokes — and a biting critique of society.He delivers a prescient take on how easily we are divided along the lines of sexuality, gender, and national identity, exposing the absurdity of these manufactured divisions.
“Divide and conquer,” as the saying goes, and Mulloy captures this perfectly — the way fear and prejudice fuel new forms of hatred.In this case, intolerance toward a race that, ironically, was human all along.(2019) In this 30-second critique, Trump, Mr.
Christie, and Mr.Hitler have an absurd conversation about flies and mosquitos.Trump and Hitler both share a mutual hatred for them, but Hitler has an extreme solution: take babies away from their mothers and lock them in cages.
The scene quickly dissolves into haunting images of immigrant children in cages, a sharp and uncomfortable critique of Trump’s policies that inadvertently draws disturbing comparisons to Nazi Germany.Mulloy received an unexpected request from MTV Europe’s creative director, Peter Dougherty, to pitch ideas for a campaign addressing social injustice.Determined to take a different approach from , Mulloy envisioned a series of roughly half a dozen 30-second shorts, each serving as a sharp, satirical observation on various issues.
“They weren’t commercial at all,” he confirmed.“They were just me doing whatever I wanted.The idea was to laugh at human existence.
It’s just a horrible moon laughing at people - at the way they behaved.” This standout episode — arguably one of Mulloy’s finest moments — depicts a man running back and forth between two brick walls on a train track, repeatedly banging his head against the wall with no success.After several attempts, he stumbles and falls off the track to avoid an oncoming vehicle.As he rises, he sees a vast forest filled with paths stretching in multiple directions.
Overwhelmed, he panics, jumps back onto the track, and resumes running toward the wall.In just 30 seconds, Mulloy delivers a biting commentary on humanity’s fear of freedom.
Phil Mulloy, British Animator Known for Dark, Satiric Work, Dies at 76
Keep it in Motion: Classic Animation Revisited - Phil Mulloy's 'The Chain'
Binocular Briefs - August 2024
Binocular Briefs - Spotlight on Animafest Zagreb
Igor Kovalyov’s ‘Before Love’ Tops 18th Animated Dreams
Cheer and Loathing in Animation: Episode 1 – The Dark Side of the Toon
Binocular Briefs - July 2025
Binocular Briefs - June 2025
Binocular Briefs - May 2025
Binocular Briefs - April 2025
