Heads Up, Ears Down

This blog accurately identifies depictions of violence and cruelty toward animals in films. The purpose is to provide viewers with a reliable guide so that such depictions do not come as unwelcome surprises. Films will be accurately notated, providing a time cue for each incident along with a concise description of the scene and perhaps relevant context surrounding the incident. In order to serve as a useful reference tool, films having no depictions of violence to animals will be included, with an indication that there are no such scenes. This is confirmation that the films have been watched with the stated purpose in mind.


Note that the word depictions figures prominently in the objective. It is a travesty that discussions about cruelty in film usually are derailed by the largely unrelated assertion that no animals really were hurt (true only in some films, dependent upon many factors), and that all this concern is just over a simulation. Not the point, whether true or false. We do not smugly dismiss depictions of five-year-olds being raped because those scenes are only simulations. No, we are appalled that such images are even staged, and we are appropriately horrified that the notion now has been planted into the minds of the weak and cruel.


Depictions of violence or harm to animals are assessed in keeping with our dominant culture, with physical abuse, harmful neglect, and similar mistreatment serving as a base line. This blog does not address extended issues of animal welfare, and as such does not identify scenes of people eating meat or mules pulling plows. The goal is to itemize images that might cause a disturbance in a compassionate household.


These notes provide a heads-up but do not necessarily discourage watching a film because of depicted cruelty. Consuming a piece of art does not make you a supporter of the ideas presented. Your ethical self is created by your public rhetoric and your private actions, not by your willingness to sit through a filmed act of violence.

The Holy Mountain

The Holy Mountain. Alejandro Jodorowsky, 1973.
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Edition screened: Included in Anchor Bay 4-DVD/2-CD set The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky, released 2007. Spanish language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 116 minutes.

Summary: Graphic depictions of dead and mistreated animals

Details:
1) At 6:45 a religious street festival includes a brief depiction of skinned canine carcasses crucified in the traditional manner and paraded on display.

2) An almost unbelievable scene begins at 8:30, signaled by a banner advertising The Great Toad and Chameleon Circus: The Conquest of Mexico. We first see living toads and chameleons elaborately costumed as Aztecs and Spaniards on a platform stage designed as an Aztec site -- a spectacle rather astounding but not noticeably cruel. A battle then is forced between the animals with real injury, a river of blood cascades from a miniature temple down over the animals, and the 3-minute Circus performance ends with the dynamited destruction of the entire stage and its occupants.

3) A series of short scenes beginning at 1:43:00 depict spiritual visions, including first a group of live horses partially buried in the sand so that their legs are not visible and they cannot move. The horses are real, but a brief depiction of a woman slicing off a section of one horses’s rump and eating it clearly is simulated. At 1:44:00 is a violent fight between two bulldogs. At 1:45:00 is a tree that has been ceremonially decorated/covered with slaughtered white chickens. At 1:48:00 we see a man who is about to be beheaded, but the scene cuts to the man instead cradling a sacrificed lamb. A small but continuous jet of blood arcs from the lamb’s neck like a ceremonial fountain, seemingly coming from a hose rather than from an artery.

Many people find Jodorowsky’s The Holy Mountain and El Topo (1970) innsurmountably off-putting. Violence toward animals is only part of a relentless structure that includes human killings, startling sexual encounters, hallucinogenic terror, and a general trouncing of matinée expectations. Unlike other films of the era that might share some of these factors, there is no accompanying sense of liberating fun or comfortable personal association. No smiling hippie call-to-arms. No bell-bottomed cuties or nostalgic music. Jodorowsky has plotted these intense spiritual trips without any rest stops, and he shouts from the driver’s seat to just hold it.

And also … These films are shockingly original, generally successful creative visions, unlike anything that came before but emulated by countless things that have come since. As with Edward Hopper's Nighthawks, you will remain unaware of how often you see quotations and just how pathetic they are until you’ve met the original. Ultimately, Jodorowsky simply is too much for many people, a fact that must be respected. But understand: To decide not to watch The Holy Mountain and El Topo, is to decide that you simply will not comprehend a sizable portion of cinema that uses these films as building blocks. You will not recognize the references, nor will you even realize that you are missing something … similar to seeing a human-sized pillar of salt and assuming it’s just a wacky geological occurrence. That’s ok, but don’t argue with people who have taken the ride.

















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