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.

Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles

Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles. Jon Foy, 2011.
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Edition screened: Focus DVD, released 2012. English language. Runtime approximately 87 minutes.

Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals.

Resurrect Dead is the type of documentary that consists mostly of people talking slowly and sincerely to the camera. That said, the subject is rather charming and the stars - the investigators of the mystery - are likable, authentic young men. I won’t bother explaining the easily researched topic, but I do have two discussion points:

1) Nobody involved in this film seems to have any concept of the complicated process required to install a mosaic composition into pavement. Our investigators think they have discovered that the Mystery Tiler “drops” the tiles into the pavement through a hole in the floorboards of a car. This would result in small ceramic pieces sitting on top of the pavement, soon to be smashed and scattered by the next few passing vehicles. The tiles in question are embedded into the asphalt or cement, flush with the road surface. Such an installation is a lot of work and requires a lot of time in the middle of the road, logistical facts that augment the mystery substantially: not just Who and Why, but How?

2) Why was the irrelevant life story of one of our three investigators included? “Jason” is a young artist of modest talent, misunderstood at school, different drummer, etc. While viewing it seems that some interesting link will emerge between the investigator and the mystery artist, or that Jason would have some special artistic insight helpful in cracking the case. But no, Jason is just another person who doesn’t understand how mosaics are installed.
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