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.

Kill List

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Kill List. Ben Wheatley, 2011.

Edition screened: StudioCanal Blu-ray , released 2012. English language. Runtime approximately 95 minutes.

Summary: Numerous depictions of murdered animals

Details:
1) A small pile of gore in the front yard at 22:50 is identified as a rabbit, and presumed left as a gift by the cat. Jay later cooks the meat and eats it.
2) A dog is found murdered along with his human companion, 53:17-53:21.
3) A cat is found hung and suffocated at the family home, 1:01:45-1:01:55. We see the bound dead body again 1:02:10-1:02:16.
4) Gal carries two dead rabbits he has shot and tosses them down by the campfire, 1:12:05-1:12:14. He skins and butchers them fairly graphically, 1:12:36-1:13:00.

The first two depictions pass quickly. The last two are rather graphic with follow-up scenes, as noted, that really allow the images to sink in.  You can skip the entire hanged sequence (1:01:45 through 1:02:16), and the only missed dialogue is Jay’s and Gal’s general grief about the incident and Jay’s determination to get to the bottom of things. Similarly, you can skip the entire rabbit butchering (1:12:05-1:13:00) and miss only general camaraderie. 

Kill List is a challenging film. It has brutally violent moments of the Irreversible type, and director Wheatley makes the unpopular decision to concentrate on mood and image rather than spoon-feeding plot. As such, it obliges our preference to scream that a film (or a painting or a sculpture) makes no sense, rather than to attempt understanding. Please allow me to point you in the right direction: An unexplained incident in Kiev indicates Jay as a potential antichrist figure. Fiona, a member of a Satanic cult, infiltrates Jay’s home and helps set him on a path toward becoming a Devil incarnate, a “reconstruction” as the mysterious wealthy client says.

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