According to the justice of the Wild West, thieves must be punished. But when the sheriff’s horse breaks, and there is no-one to oversee justice, it’s hard to forecast if justice stays justice.
We all know how the Spaghetti Western storyline goes; the wanted criminal, whorehouses and saloon gunfights. But when you draw it all out on pencil, it’s all that much more fun. Animator David Stumpf’s ‘Cowboyland‘ is a film about a drunken cowboy and his wooden horse, and his failed attempt to execute justice and capture a bandit.
In the school we got the theme of animal dressage. At the last minute, I got an idea of making fun of it, and made some “anti-dressage”. I love western, and so the idea came with drunken cowboy who is unable to realize, that his horse is not alive, but just a common child’s wooden horse. Since I had little time to prepare, many things were improvised and I handled them along the way. Most of the ideas were based on my notebook, full of drunken cowboys, naked women and chickens.
Certainly feels like something straight out of a sketchbook, which is what makes this little film full of clichés so lively. Just brace yourself for some cartoon nudity, violence and a hole lot of Western love.