About

Ghastly creations, evil schemes and experiments gone wrong, ‘Mad Science’ explores science and scientists throughout the history of cinema.

From playful interpretations of mad-cap scientists through to horror and thrillers that engage with our uncertainty for the future and unease with unknown, these films consider the role cinema plays in influencing our views of scientists, scientific ethics, and the implications of research.

Spanning the early 1920s to contemporary cinema, these narratives engage with our sneaking suspicion that our thirst for scientific investigation may be getting out of hand. Screenings include early horror classics such as Frankenstein 1931 and its campy counterpart Bride of Frankenstein 1935, to Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s The City of Lost Children 1995 and modern re-imaginings of researchers pushing the boundaries of decency in pursuit of discovery and power.

Program curated by Rosie Hays, Australian Cinémathèque

QAGOMA acknowledges the generous assistance of the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia, Canberra; the American Genre Film Archive, Austin; the NBCUniversal Archives & Collections, Los Angeles; L'Institut français, Paris; the George Eastman Museum, Rochester; the Austrian Film Museum, Vienna; the Library of Congress, Washington DC; and the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Winston-Salem in providing materials for this program.