Bunny and the Bull



Bunny and the Bull is a surreal road movie with a team up stranger than Hope and Crosby... actually, I've seen a couple of their Road to <insert destination here>  and they are pretty zany themselves. So let's just say that Bunny and the Bull does the road movie proud. The really interesting thing is that the story is told in part in flashback. Actually, that's not the interesting part. The interesting part is the visual style that the flashbacks are told in, where all the props and set appear to be made out of rubbish.

Writer/director Paul King, alumni director of The Mighty Boosh, introduces us to Stephen Turnbull, an obsessive-compulsive with a Howard Hughes like routine of collecting and organizing things like his used floss... and urine, whose whole routine is broken when he finds that mice have eaten all of the prepared meals he has in his cupboard. Ordering the vegetarian option from Captain Crab causes him to remember back to a year before when he would leave the house and his best friend Bunny. Bunny convinces Stephen to bet 50 quid on a 50-to-1 horse race with the goal of going on holiday with the winnings. They proceed to visit the most obscure museums of Europe in an attempt to cheer Stephen up, and end up in Warszawa at the National Shoe Museum. Ending up at a different Captain Crab they meet Eloisa, an amazingly profane Spaniard who Stephen fancies, and the three decide to leave Poland and go to Spain for "fiesta". Once there, Bunny declares that he will fight a bull at the "fiesta". Along the way they meet some interesting characters and have memorable adventures. I don't want to say any more for fear of spoilers.

As we flip from memories back to Stephen in his apartment, an imaginary Bunny dressed the same as Stephen in flannel pajamas trying to help Stephen heal from whatever awful thing happened on their trip. So while this movie is very amusing at times, it is also a poignant drama about how Stephen, who obviously does not have the greatest coping skills, learns to with his feelings of guilt and sadness.

I'm sure my wife will be happy to hear that this is one of those movies that is so good that it might make it into my annual rotation of films, since it will give her a chance to watch it as well.

Rating: A