No. 003 - 'A Grand Mockery' by Adam C. Briggs & Sam Dixon (2024)

Watched by Matthew Donlan at Ritz Cinemas

Adam C. Briggs is doing it like no one else in Australia with his feature, a collaboration with Sam Dixon, A Grand Mockery.

I could try to summarise the plot. Josie works at a cinema, has a girlfriend, visits the nearby cemetery and writes letters to his friend Sal.

But this movie is not for plot. Briggs and Dixon set out to capture an atmosphere, the mood of Brisbane, and have done so expertly.

Shot of stunning Super8, A Grand Mockery depicts the mental anguish (and its ill-effects) of living in outer suburbia on a minimum wage. The weight of the capitalist life, repetitive and mundane, reduces Josie to irrelevancy and drains him of creativity, having a cancerous effect. Alcohol, sex, (literal) piss do nothing to help. In fact, they only worsen the experience, creating a dizzying and regretful mood.

With jittery editing, a haunting score and gross-out prosthetics, the film crawls under your skin and sits within you. It is discomforting, precarious and entirely deliberate. The Super8 works marvellously here to create a hazy dream where everything blurs together and nothing is stationary.

In constant flux, the film descends further into surrealism, emphasising unsettling feelings through nightmarish scenes. One in particular, at the bar, feels like a blend of Lynch and Kaurismaki - a macabre world with swooning personalities and looming presences.

Cyclical scenes make the familiar eerie and set everything just off-kilter, revealing that in fact, we’re not going in circles but in a downward spiral towards a grim end.

A Grand Mockery has one more screening in Sydney today (Thursday) as part of the Fantastic Film Festival.

Editor’s Recommendation

The Hayden Orpheum is holding a one-time 50th anniversary screening of Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles this Saturday. Hailed as the greatest film of all time by the BFI, this is a rare chance to see it on the big screen.

Screenings: Thursday 15 May - Wednesday 21 May

Shooshfest | 15 May
A Silent short film competition
Thursday

Fantastic Film Festival | 24 April - 16 May (highlights)
A Grand Mockery (2024, Adam C. Briggs & Sam Dixon)
Thursday

Inner West Libraries Film Club
Things to Come (1936, William Cameron Menzies)
Thursday

Pink Flamingo Cinema
Samurai Reincarnation (1981, Kinji Fukasaku)
Wednesday

German Film Festival | 1-21 May (highlights)
Mother’s Baby (2025, Johanna Moder)
Closing Night - Moore Park
Wednesday

Berlin Alexanderplatz Part Three (1980, Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
Saturday

Riverside Parramatta
To Freely Flourish (2024, Victor Wu)
Friday

Flickerfest Best of Australian Shorts (2025)
Saturday

Roseville Cinema
The Correspondent (2025, Kriv Stenders)
Daily

Hayden Orpheum | selected highlights

The Surfer (2025, Lorcan Finnegan)
Daily

Hundreds of Beavers (2024, Mike Cheslik)
Friday

Jeanne Dielman (1975, Chantal Akerman)
Saturday

Golden Age Cinema | selected highlights
Crossing (2024, Levan Akin)
Monday

No Other Land (2024, Adra, Ballal, Abraham & Szor)
Sunday & Tuesday

F For Fake (1973, Orson Welles)
Sunday

Ritz Cinemas, Randwick | selected highlights

The Surfer (2025, Lorcan Finnegan)
Daily

Carmen & Bolude (2025, Carattini & Laossa)
Sunday

Seen (2024, Hailey Bartholomew)
Wednesday

Robert Altman Retrospective (link)
That Cold Day In The Park (1969, Robert Altman)
Thursday

Cult Classics (link)
Charlie’s Angels Double Feature (2000 & 2003, McG)
Saturday & Monday

Celluloid Film (link)
After Hours (1985, Martin Scorsese)
Friday

Classic Matinees (link)
Doctor Zhivago (1965, David Lean)
Saturday & Monday

Make It Musical (link)
Dreamgirls (2006, Bill Condon)
Sunday & Wednesday

Meet Cute (link)
Bridget Jones’ Diary (2001, Sharon Maguire)
Tuesday

Dendy Newtown | selected highlights

The Surfer (2025, Lorcan Finnegan)
Daily

True Romance (1993, Tony Scott)
As part of the Val Kilmer retrospective
Friday

A series of Wes Anderson films
Saturday

Night Shift (link)
The Seventh Seal (1957, Ingmar Bergman)
Daily

Palace Cinemas | selected highlights

The Surfer (2025, Lorcan Finnegan)
Daily

28 Days Later (2002, Danny Boyle)
Wednesday

Cult Vault (link)
Flash Gordon (1980, Mike Hodges)
Monday

Matinee Memories (link)
Citizen Kane (1941, Orson Welles)
Saturday

Art Gallery of NSW
West Indies: The Fugitive Slaves of Liberty (1979, Med Hondo)
As part of the film series ‘Folly’
Sunday

The Lovers On The Bridge (1991, Leos Carax)
As part of the film series ‘Folly’
Wednesday