(NOTE: The following review will contain minor spoilers necessary solely for the discussion of plot and/or characters. If you’re the type of reader who prefers a review entirely spoiler-free, then I’d encourage you to skip down to the last few paragraphs for the final assessment. If, however, you’re accepting of a few modest hints at ‘things to come,’ then read on …)
From the film’s IMDB.com page citation:
“An eight-year-old girl asks her scheming neighbor for help in killing the monster under her bed that she thinks ate her family.”
Like it or not, there are some who would cite the name of Bryan Fuller as the creative who set the wider Star Trek franchise into intellectual ruin: along with Alex Kurtzman, he developed Star Trek: Discovery into the stupefyingly egregious descent into non-canonical madness before departing for greener pastures. As for me, I’ve never much faulted him for the franchise’s demise as facts suggest he truly wasn’t around all that long after all; and as a storyteller the guy has a pretty solid track record worth serious consideration. After contributing scripts to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager, Fuller went on the bring such curious delights to audiences as Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, Pushing Daisies, and Hannibal. I’d much rather remember him for those efforts than Trek’s descent into the trash bin of history; and with Dust Bunny (2025) the guy shows that he definitely still has the chops to pony up something worth watching even if it might lack the longevity of his earlier projects.
To my delight, Dust Bunny feels like a whimsical recreation of Luc Besson’s groundbreaking Léon: The Professional (1994), a riveting character study shared between an introverted assassin (Jean Reno) and Mathilda (Natalie Portman), his young neighbor who finds herself orphaned when criminals murder her entire family. In that award-winning actioner, the two begrudgingly accept one another as equals, building a fragile bond of friendship that’s likely doomed to end in tragedy one way or another. Similarly, young Aurora (played by the wide-eyed Sophie Sloan) practically forces her custody onto her neighbor – known only as Resident 5B (Mads Mikkelsen) – after a hungry monster comes through the floorboards looking for dinner one night and devours her adoptive parents. While I won’t spoil it for readers, our young lead owes a bit more responsibility as to why the creature has suddenly appeared; and it’s through this twist of Fate that 5B begins wondering if he, too, might in some way be the true reason behind the loss of a seemingly loving couple.
Fuller’s direction is terrific throughout most of the action, comedy, and drama. In many ways, Dust Bunny is a bit of a narrative throwback to his television outing Pushing Daisies (2007-2009) where even the ordinary was somehow repackaged as an adult-themed Fantasy. Sets and décor are colorful and vibrant, though there are some rather obvious deficiencies (to learned eyes) when even casual backdrops are rendered as visual inserts. As an example, audiences might notice that the backgrounds in the posh restaurant where 5B meets Laverne (Sigourney Weaver), his handler: close-ups are tightly focused while almost everything just over their shoulders are wildly out-of-focus, and it grows worse as the scene unspools as definition levels constant shift. Some might argue that such an obvious distraction must be an artistic choice: I’d rather call it lazy post-production efforts.
As Dust Bunny hums along as the reveals are made, it necessarily grows increasingly violent. Again, Fuller’s expertise is in making such eccentricities work more for adult audiences, though this one is still bloodless enough to share with the kiddies. Once more, the aforementioned Léon comes to mind but imagine if that film were designed and shot by the magnificent Terry Gilliam. Methinks that’s the aesthetic Fuller was attempting to achieve, and it definitely works very well. In the second half, the film slows down a bit – even feels a bit long in a few sequences – but the ending reminds us that monsters come in all shapes and sizes and not all of them are as frightening as they could be.
If I’ve any major complaint, it would be the casting of Weaver. Her delivery never quite feels grounded here, so much so that I can’t help but wonder if even she was missing the point of it all. Having shared the screen with one of the industry’s most memorable monsters in the wider Alien franchise, perhaps she could grappled too much with the idea of a man-eating critter being a good thing to have in supply. Up until the point of her – ahem – big finish, she seemed more of a fish out of water than did the seminal creature … and that’s saying something.
Dust Bunny (2025) was produced by Dust Bunny Productions, Entertainment One, Hero Squared, Living Dead Guy Productions, and Thunder Road Pictures. DVD distribution (for this particular release) has been handled by the fine folks at Lionsgate. As for the technical specifications? While I’m no trained video expert, I can still assure readers that the fine both looks and sounds exceptional: there’s a bit of special effects trickery whenever the monster moves between worlds, and it isn’t always perfect but remains acceptable. Lastly, if you’re looking for special features? Well … they’re a bit underwhelming, to be honest, with a few of them really feeling more like bloated advertising material than anything else. I would’ve liked something a bit more interesting – maybe even a commentary track – but it is what it is.
Recommended.
Now, Dust Bunny (2025) is mostly a fairy tale, so writer/director Fuller does get a bit of a free pass when it comes to everything making perfect sense, fairy tale magic being what it is. Vividly pictured (though not without some blemishes here and there), the film moves at a good pace, making great use over a few locations as well as the budding father/daughter screen chemistry between leads Mikkelsen and Sloan. Sadly, Weaver seems almost horrifically miscast: while some of her performance might be owed to the fact that the script pulls a late-breaking reveal as to her true identity, I was still left wondering why Fuller put so much effort into concealing something so relatively inconsequential as divulging it earlier might’ve eliminated the numbing work one of filmdom’s greatest actresses delivers. Fun. Occasionally a bit slow. Yet … still fun. (Yes, there’s a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it post credits scene regarding the fate of one character, so be on the lookout.)
In the interests of fairness, I’m pleased to disclose that the fine folks at Allied Vaughn (a distributor) provided me with a complimentary UltraHD 4K Blu-ray of Dust Bunny by request for the expressed purpose of completing this review. Their contribution to me in no way, shape, or form influenced my opinion of it.
-- EZ
From the film’s IMDB.com page citation:
“An eight-year-old girl asks her scheming neighbor for help in killing the monster under her bed that she thinks ate her family.”
Like it or not, there are some who would cite the name of Bryan Fuller as the creative who set the wider Star Trek franchise into intellectual ruin: along with Alex Kurtzman, he developed Star Trek: Discovery into the stupefyingly egregious descent into non-canonical madness before departing for greener pastures. As for me, I’ve never much faulted him for the franchise’s demise as facts suggest he truly wasn’t around all that long after all; and as a storyteller the guy has a pretty solid track record worth serious consideration. After contributing scripts to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager, Fuller went on the bring such curious delights to audiences as Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, Pushing Daisies, and Hannibal. I’d much rather remember him for those efforts than Trek’s descent into the trash bin of history; and with Dust Bunny (2025) the guy shows that he definitely still has the chops to pony up something worth watching even if it might lack the longevity of his earlier projects.
To my delight, Dust Bunny feels like a whimsical recreation of Luc Besson’s groundbreaking Léon: The Professional (1994), a riveting character study shared between an introverted assassin (Jean Reno) and Mathilda (Natalie Portman), his young neighbor who finds herself orphaned when criminals murder her entire family. In that award-winning actioner, the two begrudgingly accept one another as equals, building a fragile bond of friendship that’s likely doomed to end in tragedy one way or another. Similarly, young Aurora (played by the wide-eyed Sophie Sloan) practically forces her custody onto her neighbor – known only as Resident 5B (Mads Mikkelsen) – after a hungry monster comes through the floorboards looking for dinner one night and devours her adoptive parents. While I won’t spoil it for readers, our young lead owes a bit more responsibility as to why the creature has suddenly appeared; and it’s through this twist of Fate that 5B begins wondering if he, too, might in some way be the true reason behind the loss of a seemingly loving couple.
Fuller’s direction is terrific throughout most of the action, comedy, and drama. In many ways, Dust Bunny is a bit of a narrative throwback to his television outing Pushing Daisies (2007-2009) where even the ordinary was somehow repackaged as an adult-themed Fantasy. Sets and décor are colorful and vibrant, though there are some rather obvious deficiencies (to learned eyes) when even casual backdrops are rendered as visual inserts. As an example, audiences might notice that the backgrounds in the posh restaurant where 5B meets Laverne (Sigourney Weaver), his handler: close-ups are tightly focused while almost everything just over their shoulders are wildly out-of-focus, and it grows worse as the scene unspools as definition levels constant shift. Some might argue that such an obvious distraction must be an artistic choice: I’d rather call it lazy post-production efforts.
As Dust Bunny hums along as the reveals are made, it necessarily grows increasingly violent. Again, Fuller’s expertise is in making such eccentricities work more for adult audiences, though this one is still bloodless enough to share with the kiddies. Once more, the aforementioned Léon comes to mind but imagine if that film were designed and shot by the magnificent Terry Gilliam. Methinks that’s the aesthetic Fuller was attempting to achieve, and it definitely works very well. In the second half, the film slows down a bit – even feels a bit long in a few sequences – but the ending reminds us that monsters come in all shapes and sizes and not all of them are as frightening as they could be.
If I’ve any major complaint, it would be the casting of Weaver. Her delivery never quite feels grounded here, so much so that I can’t help but wonder if even she was missing the point of it all. Having shared the screen with one of the industry’s most memorable monsters in the wider Alien franchise, perhaps she could grappled too much with the idea of a man-eating critter being a good thing to have in supply. Up until the point of her – ahem – big finish, she seemed more of a fish out of water than did the seminal creature … and that’s saying something.
Dust Bunny (2025) was produced by Dust Bunny Productions, Entertainment One, Hero Squared, Living Dead Guy Productions, and Thunder Road Pictures. DVD distribution (for this particular release) has been handled by the fine folks at Lionsgate. As for the technical specifications? While I’m no trained video expert, I can still assure readers that the fine both looks and sounds exceptional: there’s a bit of special effects trickery whenever the monster moves between worlds, and it isn’t always perfect but remains acceptable. Lastly, if you’re looking for special features? Well … they’re a bit underwhelming, to be honest, with a few of them really feeling more like bloated advertising material than anything else. I would’ve liked something a bit more interesting – maybe even a commentary track – but it is what it is.
Recommended.
Now, Dust Bunny (2025) is mostly a fairy tale, so writer/director Fuller does get a bit of a free pass when it comes to everything making perfect sense, fairy tale magic being what it is. Vividly pictured (though not without some blemishes here and there), the film moves at a good pace, making great use over a few locations as well as the budding father/daughter screen chemistry between leads Mikkelsen and Sloan. Sadly, Weaver seems almost horrifically miscast: while some of her performance might be owed to the fact that the script pulls a late-breaking reveal as to her true identity, I was still left wondering why Fuller put so much effort into concealing something so relatively inconsequential as divulging it earlier might’ve eliminated the numbing work one of filmdom’s greatest actresses delivers. Fun. Occasionally a bit slow. Yet … still fun. (Yes, there’s a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it post credits scene regarding the fate of one character, so be on the lookout.)
In the interests of fairness, I’m pleased to disclose that the fine folks at Allied Vaughn (a distributor) provided me with a complimentary UltraHD 4K Blu-ray of Dust Bunny by request for the expressed purpose of completing this review. Their contribution to me in no way, shape, or form influenced my opinion of it.
-- EZ
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