Happiness by Steve Cutts, thoughts
Happiness by Steve Cutts, 2017
TW: mentions of addiction
*scroll to the bottom for Youtube link/film TWs
thank you to @ddepressedbookworm for recommending this short film to me
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Happiness is one of my favourite animated short films of all time. The grey colouring the entire city, filled with artificial colour is reminiscent of the reality of the dull, uninspiring lifestyle of one in the city. The anthropomorphism of the rats (I assume a "pun" on living in a rat race) is an immediate representation of the disenchanted city dwellers we encounter, and might even be, in real life.
The film begins with many rats, not anthropomorphised, uncomfortably squeaking and squeezing together in what is revealed to be a train station, immediately making the film into a commentary on human life. One of my favourite things about the film is that it is filled with bright-coloured posters, but it does nothing to improve the drab surrounding. The posters are also large in quantity, pasted one after another, an extremely relevant visual representation of numbness in the face of overconsumption. It is "everything, all of the time" (Welcome to the Internet, Bo Burnham). Cutts also creates posters mimicking popular brands, playing on their tag lines and branding them "happiness", showing our consumerist nightmare for what it is ----a brutal, unfulfilled chase for happiness that fuels corporations that sell temporal "happiness" through products.
The link between consumerism and our want for happiness continues in the film as we see more products like "fast cars". The idea of a fast car, perhaps presents the wish to "get out", or float above the rest. A striking shot comes at 1:22 where the rats are seen moving through the walls of society, covered with posters, the society structured like a maze. It displays our society from an objective lens, we are confused, we are stuck.
Cutts further explores this cycle by branding some products (such as alcohol and medication) as "absolute happiness", bringing in the theme of addiction. Memorable scenes include the frenzied shopping craze where the rats, literally, tear each other apart to get their haul, and another scene where the "main character" takes medication and the visual style of the film changes from a drab, gloomy city to a shiny, too shiny, field. The main character's high, of course, ends and ultimately ends on the cold city pavement.
At the end, the "main character" chases the one thing that ties everything all together --money, the thing we chase to buy a lifestyle. The main character chases a dollar bill up a building, and then comes the summation of the film --he is trapped in a mousetrap and begins working at his desk. The film then zooms out to show everyone, identical. At the last moment, Cutts links this back to our harsh system of endless working and capitalism, further linking it to a lack of individuality. It is, as said before, a cycle. We are unhappy because of our work and therefore, we want to be happy, but we attempt to buy happiness in products, but to buy we must have money, and to have money we must work. Thus, the cycle begins, fuelling our consumerist nature which only gives more money to corporations. We are trapped, in our "mousetraps". It is all related back to our innate want of Happiness.
overall, I absolutely recommend this short film. Steve Cutt’s ability to visually get across the is spectacular. the film is smart, darkly funny, and not just relevant, but resonates on a personal level with any consumer living in the 21st century. Five stars, absolutely.
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Youtube link for short film: Happiness by Steve Cutts, 2017