DumbLand

I'm gonna tip the scales here a bit and say I enjoyed this. However, the cartoon is really only going to appeal to those who have very absurdist tendencies. It's definitely something that most people will not get, as is the nature of absurdism.

the animation is horrible, but yes, that's the point. The main character is foul mouthed, violent, and stupid. no redeeming qualities whatsoever. his wife shrieks and wails, apparently just barely capable of the most basic communication skills. most of these stories completely lack any kind of point.

but again, that's the point ;)

If non sequiters, foul language, and complete and utter randomness are your thing, you're going to love this.

It is really short, so I would probably rent instead of buying.

Since September of last year, I have been borrowing four to six films each week from the Harold Washington Library, which boasts an impressive DVD collection. (The HWL truly is a circulating library: three-quarters of its films are out at any given time!) Recently, I was thrilled to find The Short Films of David Lynch. Yesterday, knowing little about the animated series, I picked up Dumbland. I'm here to report that, for David Lynch fans, watching the eight episodes is half an hour well-spent.

The most remarkable feature of these brief pieces are their soundtracks. Each episode has its own rhythm. Respiratory and digestive systems provide percussion. Outrageous voices accent pauses' ends. Physical violence supplies the beats. Chirping birds and buzzing sockets brush along the edges. Many other elements fill out the orchestra. The pacing of the crude animation often keeps in sync with the sound, but the soundtrack itself struck me as Lynch's primary interest in creating and disseminating this work. In a way, these eight shorts are unique Lynchian rhythms.

That said, the situations are odd, ugly, profound, dumb and funny as hell. And there's enough space within them to reflect on how absurd we humans can be. I can't say that I'll watch the collection again, but for anyone who revelled in the movements that is the suite Inland Empire, Dumbland is worth half an hour of your time.

David Lynch's crude and crudely drawn take on South Park presents us with a nightmare of disturbing clichés about suburban middle class families. The father is a hideous monster with three teeth and a disproportionately large circular mouth-hole from which are uttered the most horrendous guttural noises, the son and mother are permanently horrified, incoherent creatures for whom terror is a way of life. A number of equally absurd characters are introduced throughout the series.

Lynch is not famous for his comedies (i.e. On the Air, aspects of Wild at Heart), and I am not particularly fond of comedies in general. However, there were a couple of scenes in Dumbland which made me laugh out loud. There are some clever bits of animated cinematography - where Lynch conveys wide ranges of reaction in his characters through a syntactical arrangement of shots as opposed to facial expressions (which never really vary in Dumbland).

I believe Lynch was really trying to give his audience a straight-forward, if disturbing, animated comedy here. Interestingly, he chose to follow in the footsteps of the recent wave of ultra-low-brow humor (i.e. most Will Farrell films) while adding elements of vicious social critique and classic cartoon violence and gross-out humor. While the blend doesn't really work very well here, it is nothing if not Lynchian.

Worth seeing by Lynch fans.

I consider myself a great admirer of David Lynch's works, for he provides the viewers with absolutely unique motion pictures with typical "Lynch-elements." Having seen most of his works, I naively thought I could predict Lynch's next step. I was dead wrong. Dumbland is something I could have never imagined under the name of David Lynch. Still, after my recovery from the first shock, I started to contemplate about this extremely primitive main character, and I drew the conclusion that all the absurdities, cruelty, brutality and disgust presented here are mirroring bits from reality, being emphasized by distorting it. There are things in our lives we hardly ever emphasize, for they are either disgusting or horrible, however, they are surrounding us, so I take the courage to say, Dumbland focuses on these bits and pieces. This is not a movie to enjoy, though you'll sometimes laugh out of a strange, perverted sense of humor, this is an animated reflection of all things we rather reject to observe, with its simplicity, morbidity and absurdity. Take it as it is, you don't have to like it. It just exists. And finally, if you're attentive enough, you'll find elements typical to Lynch as well. I recommend it for tolerant people!!!

The amount of times the central character brings up the concept of hypothetically defecating in his own backyard... beautiful.