This short tells the story of a pig who's responsible for "keeping the dam", a critically important job inherited from his father. We're shown that this involves winding a crank tied to a windmill on top of a dam overlooking a small town. This job must be performed at regular intervals or else the town will be consumed by...uh...water?...no, it's a dark cloud of...pollution?...What?!?
I was very confused and distracted by why the windmill on top of the dam needed to be wound, then later in the film we do get to see what happens when the dam doesn't get "kept" properly....I thought we were seeing dark water over-topping the dam and flooding the town, but it is later described as "dark clouds". The animation was so rough and impressionistic, it wasn't at all clear what we were expected to be seeing.
So...the windmill isn't a windmill but a giant fan, powered by a wound-up spring, which blows the pollution clouds away? Why is it on top of a dam? Since it's on the dam anyway, why isn't it powered by the water pressure that the dam is holding back? Also, if this job, whatever it is, is so important to the health of the whole town, why is it left in the hands of a grade-schooler?
The titular part of the story made so little sense that it took away much of my interest in appreciating the other part of the story, about isolation, loneliness, and bullying that this youngster experiences at the hands of his school classmates. When a new kid, a fox, comes to town, a unlikely friendship develops. That story was interesting and touching, but it would have been more effective without any dam keeping.
I was very confused and distracted by why the windmill on top of the dam needed to be wound, then later in the film we do get to see what happens when the dam doesn't get "kept" properly....I thought we were seeing dark water over-topping the dam and flooding the town, but it is later described as "dark clouds". The animation was so rough and impressionistic, it wasn't at all clear what we were expected to be seeing.
So...the windmill isn't a windmill but a giant fan, powered by a wound-up spring, which blows the pollution clouds away? Why is it on top of a dam? Since it's on the dam anyway, why isn't it powered by the water pressure that the dam is holding back? Also, if this job, whatever it is, is so important to the health of the whole town, why is it left in the hands of a grade-schooler?
The titular part of the story made so little sense that it took away much of my interest in appreciating the other part of the story, about isolation, loneliness, and bullying that this youngster experiences at the hands of his school classmates. When a new kid, a fox, comes to town, a unlikely friendship develops. That story was interesting and touching, but it would have been more effective without any dam keeping.