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 Snake Girl and the Silver-Haired Witch

The Snake Girl and the Silver-Haired Witch (Hebi musume to hakuhatsuma). Noriaki Yuasa, 1968.

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Edition screened: Arrow Blu-ray, released 2021. Japanese language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 82 minutes.


Summary: Depicted killing of reptiles and amphibians.


Details: The Snake Girl handles a lot of plastic snakes and a large toad, with occasional superimposed stock footage of real snakes. The two most graphic examples are:

1) A large fake toad is held by his back legs and ripped in two, 36:00-36:06.

2) A plastic snake is suspended by clips in a vat of acid, 53:25-53:32. We return to see a snake skeleton on the clips.


We also see several snakes used as melee weapons, using similar film techniques: Snake Girl picks up an obviously rubber snake and hurls it at someone’s face . . . cut to image of a real snake crawling away from the body. I was interested to learn that a snake could be thrown with such force as to deck someone. 


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