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 Nest

The Nest. Sean Durkin, 2020.

😿😿

Edition screened: Shout! Factory Blu-ray, released 2021. English language. Runtime approximately 107 minutes.


Summary: Recurring images of a dead horse.


Details:

1) Several times after the family moves to England we hear the horse whinnying in distress and kicking in his stall.


2) While the loving trainer is riding her horse, the horse gently collapses and rolls over in impending death. She strokes the horse in tearful panic as the animal wheezes. 50:40 - 51:16


2) A neighboring farmer is enlisted to shoot the suffering horse, 55:10-55:20. We hear the gun shot but the visual component is obscured.


3) The trainer and her two children cover the beloved horse’s body with sheets, then we see the body transported in the bucket of a loader and dumped into a grave, 58:12 - 1:00:50.  The dumping of the horse’s body is upsetting.


4) The trainer’s young son leads them to the horse’s grave to find that the body now is barely covered with a small amount of dirt, as though it has risen to the surface on its own. She scoops dirt away in tearful confusion to expose more of the animal, as though hoping it might still be alive. 1:37:17- 1:39:03


This excellent film is not spoiled by excessive explanation about the horse’s death, the mysterious circumstances at the grave, nor several other unexplained incidents in the house. The Nest is recommended despite the sad death of the beautiful horse. My notes above are adequate to allow you to skip the horse scenes if you wish, but you must watch the important scenes between those vignettes to understand the film.

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