Back in 2007, Carson sat in his Los Angeles apartment putting together the pieces of what might be the greatest rock ‘n’ roll cliché. Over the years, his Bobby Bird character developed the way any icon might—through critically acclaimed, multi-platform releases. First, was the Sundance selected short film The Devil In Denim, a slow-boiled, talky-doc about Bird’s tattoos and the stories behind them. The short set up Bobby’s darkly cynical and slang-spinning speaking style, which came to define the character and humor in the more narrative 2008 Sundance short film Chonto. After a quick recap of Bobby’s failed sexual singles, he got to the line that lit up his career again, “You can’t untell a tale, you can’t outslow a snail.” Like that we’re thrust into an absurd, rambling, and drug-fueled recollection of Bobby Bird’s craziest music tour when he adopts a transvestite monkey from some remote zoo/religious theme park in South America, proceeds to raise him as his own child, and fucks a whole bunch of shit up in his wake.

The film expands Bird’s universe as an exaggerated amalgamation of every rock icon of the last 50 years, yet brings the heartache and humor home through a remarkably touching tale of love and friendship shared between Bobby and Chonto. Carson’s careful reading of Bobby and the sloppy and slow-moving imagery give the story a weight that probably wouldn’t translate in a live-action version. More than an animated movie, Chonto is an illustrated story, and with unique dialogue coming out of interesting characters you don’t need expensive, snazzy effects. In fact, the homegrown aspects of the film, from the simple illustrations to the superimposed human mouths to all of the characters sounding the same, enhance the idea that this is one man’s story. In a way, it makes the fake film strangely more autobiographical since only one man does it all.

Previously on VICE Shorts – Dumpy Goes to the Big Smoke