[Premiere] Freaky Ventriloquist Dummies Populate an Oddball Norway in "Prungen"

Image courtesy of Trista Namo & Fehl Roch

Whether on kids' TV shows or in horror films starring a young Anthony Hopkins, ventriloquist puppets have an inherent ability to put the E.T.A. Hoffmann creeps on you. The uncanny unease they fill us with is fully toyed with in a new music video for Norwegian jazz collective Jaga Jazzist and their song “Prungen” from album Starfire on Ninja Tune.

Directed by Norwegian duo Trista Namo & Fehl Roch the slightly ominous and foreboding tone of the track is echoed in the unsettlingly bizarre and escalating narrative. Using live-action puppetry and CGI it sees a German man-puppet head to Norway to scatter his grandfather’s ashes in the sublime scenery of the fjords, but things quickly spiral into weirdness.

Image courtesy of Trista Namo & Fehl Roch

From the moment he steps off his tour boat and falls backwards scattering his kroner into the water, nothing really goes as planned. Along the way he angers some folk dancers, sleeps on the streets, comes across a Nazi cult, gets attacked, witnesses a fight between good and evil swastikas, and learns some not-so-nice secrets about his grandfather—all soundtracked perfectly by the frantic electronica of Jaga Jazzist.

“It started out as an idea about doing a story about a person on a seemingly easy mission,” Trista Namo explains to The Creators Project. “But through a series of mishaps he is spun in a downwards spiral ending at the place he wanted to go in the first place, but with his view on the original mission quite changed."

Image courtesy of Trista Namo & Fehl Roch

To make the vid they created their puppets (“Made in size 104 like a 4-year old child”) and shot them against a green screen, applied 3D-mapped photo backgrounds, CGI vehicles and CGI water. This mix of techniques makes the whole thing extra odd, something akin to the feel of Jan Švankmajer and The Quay Brothers, but a bit more anarchic and mischievous.

Image courtesy of Trista Namo & Fehl Roch

"There’s also a dash of Terry Gilliam’s animations from the Monty Python period in the mix," notes Namo. "We wanted to create an unnerving world for the story, and after working with digital animation techniques for a long time we were looking for something analog that could be shot live action. Ventriloquist dummies seemed to work nicely for both purposes."

Check out the music video for “Prungen” below.

Visit Trista Namo & Fehl Roch's website

here

. Visit Jaga Jazzist's website

here

. Catch Jaga Jazzist on tour at the following dates across Europe:

November 22, Santeria Social Club, Milan, Italy
November 23 - Monk Club, Rome, Italy
November 24 - TBC, Turin, Italy
November 25 - Bronson Club, Ravenna, Italy
November 26, Latteria Molloy, Brescia, Italy
November 27 - Teatro La Claque, Genoa, Italy
November 30 Fri-Son, Fribourg, Switzerland
December 1 - Alte Feuerwache, Manheim, Germany
December 2 - Gretchen, Berlin, Germany
December 3 - Stadtgarten, Cologne, Germany

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