Summary
Zip Monberg—lithe, kinetic, a comet on eight wheels—ricochets through the hush-and-taffeta sanctum of Madame Slinger’s atelier, a Paris-by-way-of-New-York salon where mannequins breathe and every seam hums with libido. Parcels fly, silk tears, and the boy-messenger becomes accidental cupbearer to a triangle of appetites: Bull Slinger, porcine mogul of ready-to-wear, whose roving eye stalks the showroom like a searchlight; Mrs. Slinger, couture-queen with shears for a scepter; and Zip’s own trembling sweetheart among the frocks. A single flirtatious pinch detonates domestic warfare—mannequins topple, tulic cascades, Zip is booted through the door, ricochets into a dental surgery where nitrous oxide dissolves the city into sylvan hallucination. Under the gas, the boutique’s mannequins shed paint and propriety, becoming dryads who waltz with a cardboard satyr-Bull while Zip, toothless and weightless, learns that desire is just another costume to slip on or shrug off. He awakens mid-extraction, sees Bull ringed by these half-remembered nymphs, grins through the ache, and yanks the mask back over his face—choosing the dream over the debt, the forest over the fabric.
Synopsis
Zip Monberg, who is a live-wire messenger boy on roller skates, gets mixed up in a fashionable modiste shop where he has gone to deliver some parcels. Bull Slinger, whose wife runs the shop, likes the girls who are employed there, but gets in wrong when he tries to "vamp" Zip's sweetheart. Bull's wife, seeing the flirtation, starts a battle, during which Zip is kicked out by Bull and chased to a dentist's office. The dentist thinks Zip wants a tooth extracted and starts the work, giving Zip gas. Zip dreams of woodlands and beauteous girls, and as he is brought back to life by the extraction, sees in a haze Bull Slinger, surrounded by all the models. Frightened, he looks at Bull, then looks at the girls and smiles, whereupon he takes the gas tube and goes back to sleep.
Director
