THE PIANO TUNER OF EARTHQUAKES
Unrated, 99 minutes

Since the late 1970s, identical twins Stephen and Timothy Quay have ascended to the pantheon of modernist animators, mostly through the use of nightmarish puppetry and surrealistic, stop-motion montages in the tradition of Walerian Borowczyk and Jan Svankmajer. Like many of their forebears, the Quays’ strong suit has always been short films; their best-known work, “Street of Crocodiles” (1986) was a 20-minute psychedelic trip through an insulated shoe box of Kafkaesque claustrophobia populated by demented, eyeless dolls.

What the Quays have lacked over the years in writing and storytelling prowess, they’ve more than made up for in aesthetic innovation, which goes a long way toward explaining why their audiences have remained small, if loyal. It also explains why they’ve only attempted two full-length features in 27 years: “Institute Benjamenta” (1996) and “The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes,” which opens today.

When Malvina (Amira Casar), a beautiful opera singer, is mysteriously killed during a performance, her corpse is whisked away by the baleful Dr. Droz (Gottfried John), who, it turns out, has faked her death so he might use her for his own strange operatic creation on his secluded island. Meanwhile, the unassuming Felisberto (Cesar Sarachu), a celebrated piano tuner, arrives on Dr. Droz’s island only to learn that there are no pianos to tune — only a set of seven intricate automata which are to be used in a mysterious grand performance and require his professional attention. Before long, Felisberto becomes obsessed with the island’s mournful prisoner and resolves to save her from the sinister doctor.

To say the story looks better on paper than it does on the screen will no doubt ring with blasphemy for Quay fans, but this dark, Dr. Moreau-inspired fairy tale would be safer in the hands of a capable screenwriter with the imagination to match the twins’ considerable visual skills. Sadly, their clunky script, awkward voice-overs, and indecipherable pacing essentially forsake the actors and make for a series of spellbinding animated vignettes with no glue to hold them together.

The Quay Brothers have typically divided audiences through the years — animation buffs have tended to overlook their longform shortcomings, while mainstream audiences have bristled at their customary lack of dialogue. If “The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes” is the Quays’ attempt to unite viewers in the middle ground, it might just as easily alienate both camps.

— Matthew Oshinsky

ALSO OPENING THIS WEEKEND

CANDY
R, 108 minutes

Dan (Heath Ledger) is a charming but reckless young poet who has fallen in love with Candy (Abbie Cornish), a beautiful young art student from a comfortable middle-class family who is attracted to Dan’s bohemian lifestyle. In order to get closer to Dan, Candy begins using heroin, and their passionate relationship then alternates between bursts of ecstatic oblivion and bouts of despair and self-destruction. Hooked as much to heroin as to one another, their story becomes a love triangle — a boy, a girl, and a drug.

LET’S GO TO PRISON
R, 84 minutes

Felon John Lyshitski (Dax Shepard) has figured out the best way to get revenge on the now-dead judge who sent him to jail: watch the official’s obnoxious son, Nelson Biederman IV (Will Arnett), survive the clink. John strikes gold when Nelson is wrongly convicted of a crime and sent to the pen he used to call home. He gleefully gets sent back to become Nelson’s cellmate and to ensure that his new buddy gets the “full treatment.” But just as revenge starts tasting sweet, Nelson becomes Big Man in the Big House and turns the tables on John.

— Staff Reporter of the Sun