Dream Doll is a 1979 animated short film (11 minutes) directed by Bob Godfrey and Zlatko Grgic. It was a co-production of the United Kingdom and the former Yugoslavia (specifically Croatia and Zagreb Films).
The story revolves around a lonely office worker in what is eventually revealed to be London. The bald, middle-aged man, seeing apparently everyone else in the world (down to the worms in the dirt) with romantic partners, gets a blow-up sex doll. The man inflates his sex doll, a busty (naturally) blonde, but it floats away.
Despairing, the man drinks himself to sleep, then trudges in for his boring office job—only to be surprised by the sex doll, which floats into his office. This gets the man fired, but romance blooms between the man and the sex doll, which, as events prove, is sentient.
Compare Kama Sutra Rides Again, another X-rated cartoon directed by Bob Godfrey.
Tropes:
- Affectionate Parody: The whole thing is a parody of the famous French featurette The Red Balloon. While the French movie is about a boy who makes friends with a sentient helium balloon, this one is a grown man who falls in love with a sentient blow-up doll. Both films are dialogue-free Silence Is Golden works. In both movies, a gang of bullies separate the protagonist from his balloon and pop it (in Dream Doll the sex doll pops when one of the bullies tries to hump it). The Red Balloon ends with all the helium balloons of Paris carrying the boy away, while this cartoon ends with all the sex dolls of London leaving their owners and carrying the middle-aged man away.
- All Balloons Have Helium: One of many, many, many cartoons that show a balloon floating despite being filled only with regular air.
- Alliterative Title: Dream Doll
- Animate Inanimate Object: The balloon floats around town, following the man.
- Bittersweet Ending: The sex doll explodes. But all the sex dolls of London, including one that is a copy of the man's sex doll, swoop down on him and carry him away.
- Drowning My Sorrows: The man passes out drunk in his chair, depressed after the sex doll floats away.
- Eiffel Tower Effect: A shot of the Parliament building near the end finally fixes the location as London.
- Falling-in-Love Montage: A deeply silly montage has the man and the sex doll walking in the park, swinging on a tree swing, and going on an Old-Fashioned Rowboat Date.
- Gang of Bullies: A gang of hoodlums in the park beat the man up and take the doll. It explodes when one of the hoodlums tries to have sex with it.
- Moral Guardians: A hatchet-faced, mean woman in the park yells at the man and whacks him with her umbrella after seeing him canoodling with the sex doll on a bench.
- Old-Fashioned Rowboat Date: Yes, the man rows his inflatable rubber sex doll on an old-fashioned rowboat date down the river.
- Silence Is Golden: No dialogue.
- Sliding Scale of Living Toys: Living sex toys, as it were. The doll is a Level 4, being able to follow the man around, while still looking just like a blow-up doll (except for the fact that it floats).
- Speaking Simlish: The only "dialogue" in the film is some gibberish, briefly heard when men on the street admire the sex doll, or when a mean lady at the park gets angry and whacks the man with her umbrella.
- Visual Title Drop: The dolls at the sex shop are under a sign that says "Dream Dolls".
- Your Television Hates You: The statue in the square depicts a man and woman having sex. The paintings and statues in the art gallery the man visits show lovers having sex. The advertisements the man sees show either scantily clad women, or men and women having sex.
