Violence to Animals in Film: The Naked Zoo

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 Naked Zoo

The Naked Zoo. William Grefé, 1970.

😸

Edition screened: In Arrow Blu-ray box set He Came from the Swamp: The William Grefé Collection, released 2020. English language. Runtime of Director’s cut approximately 92 minutes; “Barry Mahon” cut is approximately 87 minutes.

Summary: No animals or references to animals in either version of the film.

The disk includes an alternate cut of The Naked Zoo despite director Grefé’s disgust with that version. The so-called “Barry Mahon” cut includes a dopey topless scene that is as unnecessary as it is uninteresting, but also features Canned Heat performing “One Kind Favor” in its entirety, live in the protagonist’s small house! This party scene in the Director’s Cut just has records playing and some goofy conga drum slapping. The Canned Heat number, right around the 57 minute mark in the Barry Mahon cut, is very good, especially Blind Owl’s charisma and restrained guitar playing.

Even the Director’s Cut of The Naked Zoo is better than the other films in this set. The “Barry Mahon” version rearranges shots slightly without hurting the story, adds the excellent Canned Heat performance, and still trims 5 minutes off the runtime by omitting some pointless scenes. I’d say Barry Mahon is the man.

A 1961 Gottlieb Flying Circus is seen several times in the writer’s house, usually blurry and indistinct but finally clear at 56:14 in the Director’s cut.