Animator René Laloux conceived of a different approach in coming up with the content for this cartoon. He decided to use the therapy sessions for the inmates of an asylum as a basis for a story-line. Basically the patients wrote the plot and designed the backdrops. Laloux then went away and animated it. What came out was decidedly strange, yet fascinating. It begins with live action with shots of the grounds of the asylum and the patients, while a voice-over explains the set-up. Then we are thrown into the cartoon.
It's about a dentist who removes the teeth of poor patients and sells them on to the rich. A hapless victim visits him and has his teeth removed. He passes out and experiences a strange dream. The dentist then drags his unconscious body all the way out to a remote wasteland. He returns to the city but is followed by policemen. Meanwhile, a monkey magician rides a bicycle in the background seemingly directing events, which just get more and more weird until the monkey ultimately gets vengeance on the dentist on behalf of the poor victim.
It's kind of like what would have happened if the Hanna-Barbera team took hallucinogens one day and started work on a new cartoon. The result is a very surreal film, with appropriately ominous music and primitive animation. It's mostly a strange mood piece but I have to say it's pretty successfully bizarre.
It's about a dentist who removes the teeth of poor patients and sells them on to the rich. A hapless victim visits him and has his teeth removed. He passes out and experiences a strange dream. The dentist then drags his unconscious body all the way out to a remote wasteland. He returns to the city but is followed by policemen. Meanwhile, a monkey magician rides a bicycle in the background seemingly directing events, which just get more and more weird until the monkey ultimately gets vengeance on the dentist on behalf of the poor victim.
It's kind of like what would have happened if the Hanna-Barbera team took hallucinogens one day and started work on a new cartoon. The result is a very surreal film, with appropriately ominous music and primitive animation. It's mostly a strange mood piece but I have to say it's pretty successfully bizarre.