Cosmic Laundromat (Project Gooseberry) is a movie currently in development by the Blender Foundation designed to showcase Blender's new rendering engine, Cycles, among other things. This is also intended to be the first feature-length BF movie and is currently in development, though a short called The First Cycle (which presumably comprises of the first few scenes of the the finished product) has been released.
The work is still in production so the full plot is not known at this time but it is known that the central story is apparently of Franck, a suicidally-depressed sheep and Victor, a mysterious man who Franck talks to and appears to have a benevolent intent at first, but also seems to have some sort of as-of-yet unknown agenda.
The website can be found here
. The First Cycle can be watched on the website, or on the BF YouTube page, here.
This work contains examples of:
- Accidental Misnaming: The last time Franck gets Victor's name wrong seems to be accidental.
- Big "NO!": Franck, when his first suicide attempt fails.
- Black Comedy: Franck's depression and failed suicide attempts are all played for laughs.
- Determinator: Franck really, really, REALLY wants to kill himself. After the tree branch he tried to hang himself from broke, he decided to shove it off a cliff with himself still tied to it and drown instead. It takes huge effort on his part to get the log to the top of the cliff.
- Driven to Suicide: Franck. Played for Black Comedy.
- The Eeyore: Franck is suffering from suicidal depression when we first meet him.
- Green Eyed Red Head: Victor has bluish-green eyes and bright red hair and beard.
- Hidden Depths: Victor seems to think that Franck has some, claiming that he's an adventurer and a lone-wolf, while Franck insists he's just a sheep.
- I Never Told You My Name: Victor gets Franck's attention by calling him by name, even though they don't appear to have ever met before.
- Interrupted Suicide: Victor announces himself just as Franck is about to shove the log he's tied to off a cliff.
- Jitter Cam: The viewpoint camera is always shaking slightly during the conversation between Franck and Victor.
- Law of Chromatic Superiority: The first time Franck expresses any emotion apart from disdain and depression is when the bleak, leaden, cloud-filled sky begins to fill with swirling multicoloured clouds that diffuse through the black clouds like coloured ink dropped into water which begin to swirl into a tornado of colour that eventually scoops Franck and transports him to an entirely different world.
- Malicious Misnaming: Franck keeps getting Victor's name wrong, apparently because he just doesn't give a damn about what he's got to say.
- Mind Screw: Franck gets transformed into some sort of multi-coloured caterpillar thing. Then Victor climbs out of a washing machine. WTF really doesn't do it justice.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Victor looks strikingly like a younger, modern Vincent van Gogh and has a similar-sounding name (possibly intentional given it's a Dutch production and given the initial theme of the story).
- Precision F-Strike: For the first time in all the Blender Short Films; Franck drops one during his conversation with Victor.Franck: It took me ages to tie that rope with my fuckin' hooves.
- Whole-Plot Reference: There's more than a passing resemblance to The Wizard of Oz. Franck starts off in a world with a muted colour palette and finds himself drawn into a far more colourful one by an (apparently) benevolent stranger. And the method of his transportation? Tornado!
- Wolf in Sheep's Clothing: Alluded to by Victor who refers to Franck (a rather scraggly old sheep) as a lone wolf.
