Fresh Cut Grass

Fresh Cut Grass from Boulder Media on Vimeo.

   A sweet little dog visits the big city in search of his big sister. Having been close to his sister from a very young age, the little dog grows worried for her when he hasn't heard back from her in quite awhile. Also excited to see if she was finally living out her dream as a graceful ballet dancer, with a glittery congratulatory card in hand, the little dog readily sets off to find her. Considering the style used and how this film first starts, no one would have expected this animation to take... well, such a turn. But then, again, one needs to learn to expect the unexpected when attending these animation festivals... thankfully however, there was disturbing content for a reason and wasn't simply placed in for the sake of being disturbing. Granted, it has really striking visuals and a really vibrant colour palette (Which still makes the darker scenes oddly bright when they clearly aren't suppose to be). With how clean and fluid the animation and visual style appears at times, there are some times when the animation looks more 3D than 2D.The lighting is one of of the main highlights to me and is always beautifully done in each scene, be it the warm sunlight or the sleazy neon lights.


   Written and directed by Robert Cullen and produced by Boulder Media, the studio is based in Dublin and has produced shows such as Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, El Tiger, and The Amazing World of Gumball, and Season 2 of Wander Over Yonder. They are currently also producing the new series of Dangermouse. With so many favourites done by this studio, I am certainly going to keep a closer eye on them from here on out.

   While I know that there's a much deeper meaning to this story, all I could really think about was how infuriatingly creepy these human characters are, the Furries, the Beastility lovers. It almost feels like this would be what Zootopia would have been like if humans had been featured alongside the animal characters. Everyone is probably going to wonder why exactly that only humans inhabit the big city, and while there are other animals, all of them appear to be forced into that little part of town and don't appear to be working in any other jobs aside from what we have seen in the animation. Could the same story not be told if it had been an all human cast? When you think about it, the moral is pretty much that while one clearly wants to live out their own dreams, reality kicks in and sometimes, all you are allowed to do is survive. Again, could the same story not be told if the little dog and his sister be humans instead? Most of this beastility stuff feels almost unnecessary, to be honest. And while it made things more visually interesting, I still feel that animal characters don't contribute much to this story aside from the fact that there's clearly some sort of prejudice going on here... which again can be shown through human characters.