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.

House of the Living Dead

House of the Living Dead. Ray Austin, 1974.
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Edition screened: Included on Vinegar Syndrome DVD #117 Drive-In Collection: Crypt of the Living Dead/House of the Living Dead, released 2016. English language. Runtime approximately 88 minutes.

Summary: Tortured and murdered animals.

Details:
1) The movie begins with a screaming black monkey (identified as a baboon in the film) held by the head by a man in a hooded black cloak, 00:09. The largish monkey then is wrapped in burlap and carried away through 00:58.
2) Montage of caged laboratory animals through the opening credits, ending at 4:09.
3) The monkey is carried into the lab at 4:09, limp and seemingly dead if not for his blinking, and is strapped to a table through 4:37.
4) Bloody cranial operation to the monkey with a large auger drill and needles, 4:59-5:30, and again at 6:29-6:50.
5) Severed head of a horse found lying in a garden, 51:14-51:25.

This is a terrible movie in every way, and would remain terrible without the mean animal abuse. The acting, the sound quality, the script, all are atrocious. Much of the film has very bad lighting and contrast, making long scenes even more unpleasant and aggravating to watch.



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