Synopsis
Animation about a UFO cult, its leader, and her disciples. Created using a variety of materials including construction paper, gouache, watercolor, and digital.
The Final Exit of the Disciples of Ascensia
2019 Directed by Jonni Phillips
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Alternative Title
The Final Exit of the Disciples Ascensia
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To preface this review: I’m kinda embarrassed to post this because it’s almost 3 am and I don’t think my writing is good in the slightest, but I really wanted to finally tackle and put into the words how this film makes me feel. Truly just a jumbled mess but oh well
TW // suicide
Please acknowledge my existence. Acknowledge my endless cries for help. My eyes that were filled with pain when I first uttered the words “I want to die” at such a young age. The time I spent alone, neglected by you, neglected by those I cared so deeply for. I thought you cared the same for me. There was an agony that spawned so deep inside of…
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I LOVE the different styles of animation, and the main paper cutout style is really awesome, and I have a lot of respect for the effort of the animators. I think my favorite style was the abstract paintings on a black background animated by Jeanette Fantone. (Seriously, check out this TRIPPY 2 minute video she did!!)
The story is really interesting and I like the loneliness and anxiety all the characters deal with in different ways. I love the exaggerated style in the character designs and movements, and the ukulele songs are great.
However, I felt it was a bit long, and I wasn't really a fan of the voice acting. I think I would have preferred this paced differently,…
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I am so in love with Jonni Phillip's animation- it's so melancholy, heartwrenching, and beautiful. You often see people online talking about great animation and what they're talking about is really well-rendered art. What Jonni does is so stripped down it's more like puppetry- you can see all the strings- and yet despite the illusion being 'broken' the viewer is completely transported into the world brought to life on the paper. Animation is a tremendous arcane magic and Jonni Phillips is a fearsome sorcerer.
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Isn't this wonderful? I'm already in love with Jonni Phillips' idiosyncratic style, from the mixed-media animation to the blunt dialogue, and their tackling of the subject matter is excellent. The Final Exit doesn't diminish the gravity of cults, but it manages to weave amusing worldbuilding into an empathetic examination of the members. Even without the rest of Wasteland, the longer piece this is a segment of, the universe this inhabits is incredibly interesting. I'd love to visit it again, in one way or another :)
Please watch this, if you haven't! -
62/100
Deeply passionate and emotive work from Phillips that's really well told. The film functions as an expressionistic view of the world through the eyes of a troubled woman; everything we see is an extension of their mind and the way they see the world. The many styles and visions, representative of an entire spectrum of human emotion are displayed beautifully through the varied world. This is, above all else to me, a movie about finding where you fit in. About not knowing where you're heading, and not seeing anyone who loves you. It's about being scared and afraid that you're the only person in this world, and running to anything that will accept you. Finding yourself trapped in the…
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“All alone except for everyone, on our asteroid turning.”
This film is hard to describe to people who haven’t seen it. Saying ‘a story about a UFO cult inspired by the Heaven’s Gate mass suicide’ doesn’t really paint a clear picture.
It carries with it this special sort of intimacy that other films rarely do. When the characters speak, it feels like they’re speaking to each other, unfiltered, not to an audience. Jonni Phillips’ animation is such a joy to watch. Her characters are so emotive and there’s always something new to pick up on every rewatch. The story beats and pacing are natural and the character arcs are satisfying, even if they don’t necessarily end happily.
I keep coming back to this film. I don’t think I’ll ever be done with it. It’s beautiful and weird and jarring and touching. I’ve never seen anything like it.
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A charmingly off-kilter low-budget animated riff on the story of the Heaven's Gate cult that tackles depression, abuse, belief vs. doubt, cult indoctrination tactics, the human search for meaning in life, and the ways society fails people who can't fit into the established order. In less than 45 minutes! With songs! And a whole lot of absurdist cartoon humor!
This all might sound disrespectful to the actual events that clearly inspired ASCENSIA's plot, but Philips &co. provide one of the least condescending, most emotionally affecting takes on Heaven's Gate (and cults in general) I've ever seen. While I've never been involved in a cult myself (probably, if I'm honest, due mainly to sheer dumb luck), I spent years of my…
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Jonni Phillips is one of the best independent animators working today— full stop: and THE FINAL EXIT OF THE DISCIPLES OF ASCENSIA may be her magnum opus
it caps off the WASTELAND series by being not only the longest of the segments— but also the most intensive in how far it’s willing to stretch the series’ core theme (or at least one of god knows how many): the deconstruction of belief systems
Jonni has gone on record (at least from what I can remember) about how fascinated she was by Marshall Applewhire (or “Do”) and his Heaven’s Gate UFO religion (I couldn’t blame her in how similarly entranced I am by them)— but rather than framing it from the typical…
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every time i rewatch this i want to write about how much this film means to me but the words escape me.
