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7.6/10
Senior Film Conservator
A definitive 7.6/10 rating for a film that redefined the boundaries of cult cinema. The Male Man remains a cornerstone of transgressive art.
If you have seven minutes to spare and love old, slightly creepy cartoons, The Male Man is a wild ride. But if you hate rubber-hose logic or get freaked out by weird hooded figures, skip this one. 📬
It stars Bimbo, who is a mailman just trying to do his job. He delivers tons of letters, and then things get very weird.
He gets a request from this creepy leader of some hooded monsters. Their envelope keeps growing bigger and bigger, which is honestly kind of stressful to watch.
The animation has that classic Fleischer studio bounce where everything, even the mailboxes, seems to be breathing. It's way livelier than some other shorts from the era, like Mickey's Champs, which feels a bit more formulaic.
I love how Bimbo doesn't even seem that bothered by the hooded guys at first. He's just like, "Okay, another day, another giant growing letter."
There is this one shot where the envelope fills up almost the whole screen. It feels like a fever dream.
The sound design is super noisy too. Gus Wicke and Billy Murray do some voices, and it just sounds like a chaotic mess of mumbling and brass instruments. 🎺
It reminded me a bit of the frantic energy in Perils of the Rail, even though that is a completely different kind of movie. Both just have this "no brakes" feel.
The ending comes out of nowhere and doesn't really explain anything. But honestly, who cares?
Sometimes you just want to watch a dog cartoon character get bullied by supernatural paper.