Short Film: Crank Balls (USA, 2007)

Crank Balls by Devin Bell from Devin Bell on Vimeo.

This cute little 5-minute-long stop motion short is from Devin Bell, an MFA graduate of animation at California Institute of the Arts. Shot on digital video, it seems to be his only film to date. It’s been rather an Internet hit and has been making the rounds the past year, and not unjustly so. The deceptively simple plot—in a drab, colorless netherworld, three Crank Balls are living their insignificant existence until one gets infected by happiness and promptly infects the rest (shades of unprotected sex!)—is well-presented in a humorous, almost frightening manner. The Invasion of the Body Snatchers was never as quick as this! Is it a paean to conformity, and how it is always there in some form or other, or does it symbolize the steady progression of mass delusion? Who cares, really—it’s funny.