Bunnyhood

A teenage girl gets hoodwinked by her mother in order to get her to hospital where she needs to have an important operation.

From director and animator Mansi Maheshwari, Bunnyhood is a short animation which is based on an event which happened earlier on in her life, as well as her observations of the little white lies we tell each other that she found when she first came to Britain. As a student of the National Film and Television School, Maheshwari was able to develop her animation skills and blend them with her love of storytelling, especially in the comedy genre. Mixing a little bit of horror in with the comedy seemed like an obvious choice for Maheshwari, as she already had the outline of Bunnyhood fleshed out in her head from her own experiences, and the film was created as part of her graduation project.

Bunnyhood follows the tribulations of Bobby (also Maheshwari), a teenage girl who lives her life as a lot of teenage girls do – playing video games, complaining a lot and constantly expecting food and other things to be provided instantly by her mum. On this particular day, however, Bobby’s mum (Wadia) has other designs on her mind, and a trip to the local burger joint, Big Patties, is posited as a rare treat. Unbeknownst to Bobby, Mum decides to take a little detour to the hospital and manages to use more little white lies to get Bobby inside, where a large portion of her family are already waiting.

Once inside the hospital, Bobby is led through a prep room and then into the operating theatre where she is to get her appendix removed. The doctors and nurses begin to morph and transform into hairy demons which resemble the bunnies that Bobby was destroying earlier on in her video game. Under the effects of the anaesthetic, Bobby gets to meet her appendix and they have a discussion on the nature of white lies and trust, all while the operation is happening around them. Once Bobby comes out the other side she must then decide how much she can trust her mother, who tries to argue the necessity of protecting her from the truth, and how much that will affect their relationship from now on.

The striking thing about Bunnyhood, is the animation style which Maheshwari has chosen to adopt to relay her story. Taking the form of what look like ballpoint scratchings, the characters and locations all emit a certain unnerving quality. Features such as the teeth and the limbs are prominent and exaggerated, and the movement of the animation sometimes feels like you’re being pushed through the middle of a fisheye lens. The whole impression that you get from watching Bunnyhood is one of a nightmarish fever dream, where nothing is quite as it seems and danger lurks around every corner. The off-kilter music provided by composer Marcin Mazurek also helps keep the viewer off balance, as a series of bangs and crashes and percussive noises are thrown around alongside the visuals.

While Bunnyhood comes across as a fairly hairbrained and scattered animation, its style fits perfectly with the emotions and themes it is trying to portray. Nothing is clear for Bobby or the viewer and the feeling that anything could happen is all part of the shrouded narrative. There’s a slight resemblance of the Blue Meanies in Bobby’s appendix and Bunnyhood is not in itself a million miles away from the madcap freneticism of Yellow Submarine (1968) or some of Terry Gilliam’s work, where the audience is kept guessing as to what’s coming next. For what is obviously a personal story for Maheshwari, Bunnyhood gets across its message fairly clearly, it’s just that the manner of its delivery will not be to everyone’s taste.