Monday, May 21, 2018

Countdown to Thirteen: Mr. Dorothy (2009)


This is such a weird short.  I’ll be perfectly honest – until I read the YouTube description, I didn’t get it.  In retrospect, I could see it, but I still don’t know that it completely makes sense, and given that I needed an assist to understand it, it’s not altogether successful in what it tries to do.

A mother reads her child an unnverving bedtime story about a lonely, hateful monster.  Over her narration, we see a young man methodically dressing up in blackface before going about his day.

It’s a bizarre little short, and I’m not really sure what to think of it.  The scenes of the man in blackface juxtaposed with the creepy fairytale narration are effectively disturbing, although I’m not convinced the short fully sells me on it.  Still, it’s interesting enough.  Where it starts to fumble for me is in the second half, which gets away from the bedtime story and deals more with the characters.  There, the themes break down a little, and as I said, the plot itself isn’t conveyed that clearly.  Once I read the YouTube description, I was able to get what they’re going for, but I still don’t really get why they go about it the way they do.

Jodie Whittaker plays the mother.  There isn’t much to this part, even though, by reading the fairytale, she has the brunt of the dialogue.  She’s really more of a narrator than a character – for a while, I thought we were only going to hear her in voiceover, but she she does appear onscreen briefly toward the end of the short.

Accent Watch

Northern.

Recommend?

In General – Naw.  While it’s interesting, it’s not tight enough and doesn’t give a clear enough sense of what it’s doing.

Jodie Whittaker – No.  There’s not really enough for her to do.

Warnings

Blackface, strong thematic elements, disturbing images, and brief violence.

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