ArcaMax

Evicting a monster from under your bed is no longer the childhood nightmare it used to be. In scarier times, the afflicted kid might have had to appeal for parental assistance -- always the least likely source of relief -- or maybe improvise some "Home Alone"-style household armaments. In desperation, the unlucky tyke might have needed to hire a fairytale lawyer -- a major pain, as you might imagine.

Nowadays, as we see in the new movie "Dust Bunny," things are much easier -- anyone being menaced by some fearsome entity can simply seek out a professional monster-killer. Chances are, there's one closer at hand than might be expected.

With this movie, TV fantasy god Bryan Fuller, the writer and showrunner instrumental in such acclaimed small-screen series as "Pushing Daisies" and "Hannibal," is making his feature-film debut. (He's been picky about such projects, apparently.) The movie is a marvel of magic-level production design (by the gifted Jeremy Reed), delivering a nighttime world of moonlit alleys, underworld nightclubs, and clouds of fog floating around just about everywhere.

The picture bears a strong resemblance to "Leon: The Professional," Luc Besson's 1994 action classic about a newly orphaned 12-year-old girl who hooks up with a Mafia hitman for purposes of retribution. In "Dust Bunny" the irritated tyke is 10-year-old Aurora (Sophie Sloan), whose parents have been devoured by the monster that lives under her bed -- a creature in whom the departed 'rents never believed. (Although "they do now," she coolly notes.)

Looking around for help, Aurora spots a shopworn monster-killer (Mads Mikkelsen) who lives right down the hall in her apartment building. After witnessing this nameless character's lethal skills in a Chinatown dragon battle one night, she steals $22.47 in a clever way and takes it to the man's nearby apartment, which is 5B. (In fact, let's call him that: 5B.) "Is that enough money to procure your services?" Aurora asks, after talking her way into 5B's eccentrically furnished digs. "How do you know the word 'procure'?" he asks.

The movie gets off to an enchanting start as we watch Aurora navigating the halls of her building in a hippopotamus-shaped gondola, pushing her way down corridors with a candy cane-patterned pole while feathers fall gently from the ceiling. Later, 5B has a meeting in a great leafy greenhouse with his handler, a woman named Laverne (Sigourney Weaver, atypically overacting). Later yet, in a red-lit sushi restaurant, we watch a bite of shumai turn into a miniature rabbit (there's a lot of rabbit-consciousness in this movie) on its way into someone's mouth. There's also a minimally expressive appearance by David Dastmalchian, as effortlessly creepy as always, playing a thug-master on 5B's trail.

So there's a lot going on in this movie. Unfortunately, the story, which has the basic simplicity of a folk tale, has to be extensively stretched out to justify its feature length. We're continually being fed some unexpected new nibble of information about the characters -- especially Sloan's Aurora, whose backstory is more complicated than most people might guess or credit. Mikkelsen's monster-hunter, on the other hand, remains something of a blank throughout the picture -- a waste of such a strong actor. And while Fuller has provided some peppery dialogue throughout, occasional lines are stillborn. ("I'd hug you," says Laverne, "but as you know, I don't put effort into such things.")

What holds the movie back from the cult-classic status it might have attained is the tsunami of CGI -- much of it brilliant -- which is the picture's true subject. As the fantastical images pile up, one after another after another, some viewers may find their interest beginning to wither, and in the end possibly expire.

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To find out more about Kurt Loder and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators website at www.creators.com.

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