One Man Band, another hilarious animated short film made in 3D which was written and directed by Andrew Jimenez and Mark Andrews, also produced by Osnat Shurer, head of Pixar's Shorts group, seems to be entertaining. The story brings up many kinds of themes that makes the story seems to be interesting which can be obtained by most of us as viewers. Especially the greed, which is one of the most popular theme since it was already written by almost all of the blog authors who post the entries about this short film. Yes, it is the greed that dominates the opinion of viewers towards the themes of the film, which is also dominating the whole story within the film.
It appears to be obvious when we see Bass, a street performer playing a routine tune on a deserted Italian village square one fine afternoon, waiting for a pedestrian to tip him in his rusty iron cup. Soon, he spots Tippy, a humble peasant girl clutching a big gold coin, with the intention of dropping it in the piazza fountain to make a wish. Bass, seizing the opportunity, immediately plays an impromptu track, capturing the young girl's attention. Just when Tippy is about to drop the coin into Bass's cup, a newcomer steps onto the scene. Treble, a suave and flamboyant street performer, plays a more attractive sound, effectively stealing Tippy's attention, much to the anger of Bass. Not to be outdone, Bass ups his ante, with Treble daring to take it even further. The two rivals unleash their arsenal of musical weapons, trying to vie for the attention (or rather, the tip) of Tippy. From this point, it can be seen how the greed is unleashed between the two performers, performing their tracks with their own determination and hope just to grab a little girl's single little coin.
The story continues when the girl cowers in both performer's wild musical cacophony and in the process, accidentally drops her sole gold coin, which falls down a drain and gets lost in the sewers of the village. Heartbroken, Tippy sheds a single tear, but then angrily demands from Treble and Bass a replacement coin for the one they made her lose. When the two musicians come up empty-handed, Tippy insists she take one of Treble's violins and Bass's iron cup in an attempt to get her money back by playing solo. She then tunes the violin and begins to play it like a true virtuoso, prompting a passing pedestrian to drop a large bag of gold coins into her cup. Elated, Tippy hugs the bag and approaches the fountain, but not before she pulls two coins out of her bag and tempts Treble and Bass. But as they eagerly reach out to grab them, she tosses the coins into the top of the fountain, out of reach, to the dismay of the two one-man-band units. Then there is a post-credits scene shows that it is now nighttime, with Treble standing on Bass, trying to reach for the coins in vain.
By referring to the end of the story, both performers are still greedily struggling to retrieve back the gold coin which is out of reach of them. Ironically, they don't compete each other for the coins in that part and instead of that, they cooperate together for it! Of course, they might forever become rivals to each other, but just for their greed's sake, they are willing to cooperate. Friendship is not possible be involved here because their cooperation is because of their greed and not by their 'sudden friendship'. Therefore we can see that the story also involves irony in which the two one-man-bands cooperate together instead of competing with each other, and their cooperation is a sham value as their act of cooperation is stimulated by their own greed.
Based on the story, the two musicians were rivals, battling to stand out in order to be tipped by the little girl. As the story evolves, they become more aggressive and desperate for the girl's attention. Finally at the end of the story, they work together to get to the coins in which the little girl threw on the top of the fountain in the piazza.
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