Worms Ate My Flesh
Some time ago, New-Zealand-born musician/filmmaker Broad Oak had a particularly vivid and disturbing dream. "I was dead and buried in the ground, yet somehow conscious," he says. "Lying there in complete darkness, I could feel worms and insects devouring my flesh and crawling through my eye sockets." The next day he was inspired by the experience to record a piece of music but only finished it in 2021 while recovering from covid in Berlin. "Although I didn't have a severe case, it led to me contemplating my own mortality so it felt appropriate to come back to this piece and finally finish it." The mesmerising animated video is a collaboration with an AI called WZRD and represents the cyclic and transformative nature of life and matter from cells to galaxies.
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Nigel BraddockDirector
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Nigel BraddockMusic
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Project Type:Animation, Experimental, Music Video, Short, Web / New Media
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Runtime:4 minutes 56 seconds
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Completion Date:June 25, 2021
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Country of Origin:New Zealand
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Country of Filming:Germany
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Film Color:Color
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First-time Filmmaker:No
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Student Project:No
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ALC Video Art FestivalAlicante
Spain
May 5, 2022
Official Selection -
Hiroshima Animation FestivalHiroshima
Japan
August 17, 2022
Official Selection -
Bloomington Indiana Film FestivalBloomington
United States
April 9, 2022
Official Selection -
Anibar Animation FestivalPeja
Kosovo
July 11, 2022
Official Selection -
AI International Film FestivalSalt Lake City
United States
March 11, 2022
Best Music Video, Best AI Graphics -
Mediawave International Film and Music GatheringGyőr
Hungary
May 4, 2022
Official Selection -
Boden International Film FestivalBoden
Sweden
February 13, 2022
Official Selection -
Bamburger KurzfilmtageBamburg
Germany
January 28, 2022
Official Selection -
Courant 3D Film FestivalAngouleme
France
October 5, 2021
Official Selection -
Vagrant Film FestivalGomel
Belarus
June 10, 2022
Official Selection -
Anmtn!Online
May 29, 2022
Official Selection
Originally trained as a classical pianist in his native New Zealand, Braddock set up his own record label, Monkey Records, in 2000. As well as making a career as a music producer, band manager and dj, he has been involved in producing and directing quite a few of the music videos released by his label. Now based in Berlin, he makes music and video as Broad Oak and plays in bands The Mung Beings and Cosmo and the Cosmonaut with his son.
The music for Worms Ate My Flesh was inspired by a very intense dream I had and so collaborating with WZRD AI seemed like a perfect match. The hallucinatory abstract morphing images work beautifully with the music in creating a surreal dreamlike state. The dream itself began as a nightmare about my own death but ended in acceptance and a certain peace. I tried to capture that journey in the progression of this video from chaos and decay to unity.