It should come as no surprise that Bryan Fuller’s feature directorial debut, Dust Bunny, is a mix of surreal childlike fantasy and brutal violence. Fuller is best known for his television work, mostly on shows that mix genres including Pushing Daisies, Hannibal, American Gods, Wonderfalls, and my favorite, Dead Like Me. Bound to be a Midnight favorite, the film nevertheless boasts some odd stylistic choices and takes a while to get going, but it’s tough to complain when the story centers around Mads Mikkelsen killing monsters. I mean, who doesn’t want to see that?
Dust Bunny is a weird movie, and that is part of its charm. The opening is slow going and nearly wordless, as it establishes Sophie Sloan as Aurora, a young girl with a monster living under her bed. The creature literally resembles a dust bunny, and hides beneath the floorboards. Aurora’s parents don’t believe her, of course, until they themselves are eaten up by the monster. On a whim, Aurora follows her neighbor in apartment 5B (Mikkelsen) out into the city night, and watches as he slices up what she believes to be a raging dragon. Convinced that he can help her, she schemes her way into some money and tries to hire 5B to kill the monster under her bed.
While gradual in its pace, it should be noted that Dust Bunny is stunning visually. Fuller, who has always favored splashy, vibrant colors, makes the film look like a live-action comic book come to life. When 5B goes on the attack during a spectacular city parade, the scenes practically jump off the screen they are so beautiful. Much of the film looks like this and you will never get sick of looking at such wonderful imagery.
Things pick up once Aurora and 5B start conversing, as Mikkelsen and Sloan have wonderful chemistry. She’s a cheeky kid, naive but all the same too smart for her own good. 5B is a classic Mikkelsen character; tough and charismatic with a surprising tenderness. He suspects there’s more going on with Aurora’s monster than she knows, and feels obligated to help the kid out. Fuller, who also wrote the script, doles out information sparingly, which is good because this isn’t the most robust story in the world. There’s a lot of filler, full of oddball characters who add little to the overall story.
On the other hand, you’ve also got Sigourney Weaver as 5B’s handler, in a role that seems perfectly suited for her and reminds us of what a badass she still is. There are also fun appearances by The Woman King‘s Sheila Atim, showing off her comedy and physicality, and David Dastmalchian who is, naturally, a complete freakazoid. Would we expect anything else from him?
Some of the choices Fuller has made also make me wonder what the overall goal of Dust Bunny was. He and DP Nicole Hirsch Whitaker shoot in 3:1 aspect ratio, an unusual choice that will be jarring for audiences and incompatible with a lot of movie theaters. Also, the tones often clash in a bad way, with the film too violent for kids and too childlike for many adults. It’s tough to understand who the audience really is for this.
However, Dust Bunny has more than its share of charms. You won’t find a hitman movie like it anywhere, and Fuller has a unique vision that is always welcome. It’s an imperfect but entertaining movie, with Mikkelsen giving the genre crowd everything they could ask for in a storybook world they might not have expected.
Dust Bunny opens in theaters on December 12th from Roadside Attractions.
