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.

Loulou

Loulou. Maurice Pialat, 1980.

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Edition screened: Included in Cohen The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 1 Blu-ray set, released 2016. French language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 105 minutes.


Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.


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Demon (Wrona)

Demon. Marcin Wrona, 2015.

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Edition screened: Included in Severin Blu-ray box set All the Haunts Be Ours: A Compendium of Folk Horror Volume 2, released 2024. Polish language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 94 minutes.


Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals.


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Magnificent Obsession (Stahl)

Magnificent Obsession. John Stahl, 1935.

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Edition screened: Included with Criterion Blu-ray #497 Magnificent Obsession, released 2019. English language. Runtime approximately 102 minutes.


Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.


Criterion includes this early adaptation of the Lloyd C. Douglas novel as a bonus Blu-ray in their release of Douglas Sirk’s (superior) 1954 Magnificent Obsession. 


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Numéro deux

Numéro deux (Number Two). Jean-Luc Godard, 1975.

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Edition screened: Olive Blu-ray, released 2012. French language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 88 minutes.


Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.


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The Velvet Underground (Haynes)

The Velvet Underground. Todd Haynes, 2021.

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Edition screened: Criterion Blu-ray #1164, released 2022. English language. Runtime approximately 120 minutes.


Summary: No animals or references to animals in the film.


The Criterion release also includes three short films made by associates of Warhol and The Velvet Underground, and relevant to the environment of the time and place:


• Award Presentation to Andy Warhol (1965 Jonas Mekas, 12 minutes)

• Venus in Furs (1965 Piero Heliczer, 22 minutes)

• Walden: Diaries, Notes, and Sketches [excerpt] (1969 Jonas Mekas, 8 minutes)


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Sinthia: The Devil’s Doll

Sinthia: The Devil’s Doll. Ray Dennis Steckler (as Sven Christian), 1969.

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Edition screened: Included in Severin Blu-ray box set The Incredibly Strange Films of Ray Dennis Steckler, released 2022. English language. Runtime approximately 77 minutes.


Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals.


This is about as good and bad as an underground erotic performance art film possibly could be.


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