The Totalitarian Blueberry

Let's take a brief trip to the bookshelf and fish out a dictionary to look up a word that is probably unfamiliar to a lot of people: "totalitarian adj. of or relating to a centralized dictatorial form of government requiring complete subservience to the State" (source: The Concise Oxford Dictionary). So we are dealing with a movie centred on a domineering blueberry. More specifically, we are looking at a blueberry that is controlling someone or something. Unless you are thinking of genetically modified blueberries that are starting to take over the world, this doesn't sound very interesting just by looking at the title, does it? But actually, The Totalitarian Blueberry is good. It may be remarkably simple, but is damn effective.

That’s enough of looking at the title. I'll cut to the chase. The setting of all this is easy to follow: a woman has dropped a blueberry. Fair enough, I guess. But she leaves the blueberry there, lying on the floor, and it's driving the man sitting behind her completely crazy. The whole short revolves only around a single blueberry, and it is obvious Wagner wants us to focus on it; he puts v3dmm to great use by making the movie black and white apart from the blueberry, which stands out with its blue colour. Okay, I lied. In fact, the woman's lips and the man's eyes are also blue. Genius. This is all linked with the man's thoughts on this one blueberry, and these little touches wonderfully emphasize his obsession. But what makes the movie fine to watch and amusing is what is going on inside the man's mind. Charles DeVillier does an excellent job voicing the monologue of the guy's thoughts, showing anger, frustration and desperation, and the actual monologue itself, written by no other than Wagner himself, has been written with much effort and care. Yes, there are one or two phrases that seem to reoccur, but they can be easily ignored. And that's pretty much the whole movie--hearing a monologue in a diner about an irrelevant blueberry. Oh, and the blueberry gets accidentally squashed in the end by the woman. His reaction to this is, well, predictably not the happiest.

Technically everything is kept very simple, which is both good and bad. I love the basic setting of the diner. Keeping the surroundings very straightforward puts more focus on the monologue, and guides you to concentrate more on the man’s thoughts. The animation too is rather basic. As simple as it is, it does not really affect the short in a bad way, mostly because of the lack of actions actually happening on-screen. However, a small flaw that did affect The Totalitarian Blueberry noticeably was the camera angles. They did not seem varied enough to create a potentially more passionate atmosphere surrounding the man, staring at the blueberry. Wagner could have put even more focus on the blueberry, and it is a little of a wasted opportunity. That was not the only thing that was bugging me slightly. As much as I liked the concept of the short, I felt there was space to expand. I felt that there could have been more, and I was not completely satisfied by the time the movie ended. It just felt a little bit lacking.

However, the Totalitarian Blueberry is both humorous and likeable, and although it does not quite reach the standards of other shorts, such as Liquid Sunshine or Bruised, you will be hard-pressed not to like it to some extent, whether if it is the dialogue, the general concept, or seeing v3dmm's potential. Without v3dmm, The Totalitarian Blueberry would not have worked anywhere as well, and it is safe to say that v3dmm opens up so much potential, waiting to be explored. I am sure I am not the only one who thinks this when I say that I will welcome any new and innovative movie aided by v3dmm. This movie was a small, but tasty treat, and this has made me look forward to future Wisdom Tooth episodes even more, as Wagner has already clearly shown that he can find great ways of utilising v3dmm.