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 School (Borowczyk)

The School (Szkkola). Walerian Borowczyk, 1958.
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Edition screened: Included on Arrow Blu-ray Story of Sin, released 2017. Scored, no dialogue track. Runtime approximately 7 minutes.


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

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Scorpio

Scorpio. Michael Winner, 1973.
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Edition screened: MGM/UA DVD, released 2000. English language. Runtime approximately 114 minutes.

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


Alain Delon treats cats nicely throughout the film.

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The Scum of the Earth

The Scum of the Earth. Herschell Gordon Lewis, 1963.
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Edition screened: Included with Blood Feast in Arrow box set The Herschell Gordon Lewis Feast, released 2016. English language. Runtime approximately 75 minutes.

Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals.











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Season of the Witch

Season of the Witch (Hungary Wives, Jack’s Wife). George A. Romero, 1972.
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Edition screened: Included in Arrow Blu-ray box set George A. Romero: Between Night and Dawn, released 2017. English language. Runtime approximately 104 minutes.

Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals.

An excellent film, hampered only by a few cheesy decisions during the dream-sequence introduction that unfortunately tilt the movie’s reputation toward that of “B” movie or drive-in fodder. While the introduction contains some badly-produced special effects and wincey inclusions, it also is compelling and interesting in the vein of Don’t Look Now’s superb opening. After this intro and the main character’s short but dopey visit to her psychiatrist’s office, Season of the Witch is 90 minutes of excellence: acting, costuming, dialogue, tone, sets, pacing, all are superb. Even the representations of witchcraft are not too idiotically pandering.

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The Seduction of Cindy/Tara Tara Tara Tara

The Seduction of Cindy/Tara Tara Tara Tara. Leonard Kirtman (as Leon Gucci), 1980.
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Edition screened: Vinegar Syndrome DVD #227 Peekarama: The Seduction of Cindy/Tara Tara Tara Tara, released 2018. English language. Cumulative runtime approximately 158 minutes.

Summary: No animals in either feature.

• The Seduction of Cindy, 1980, approximately 80 minutes. 4.5/5❤
• Tara Tara Tara Tara, 1980, approximately 78 minutes. 3/5❤
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The Seduction of Mimi

The Seduction of Mimi (Mimì metallurgico ferito nell'onore). Lina Wertmüller, 1972.
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Edition screened: Kino Blu-ray, released 2012. Italian language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 112 minutes.

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


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Seeds

Seeds. Andy Milligan, 1968.
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Edition screened: Included on Vinegar Syndrome Seeds/Vapors Blu-ray #196, released 2017. English language. Runtime approximately 81 minutes.

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

The VS release also includes the ‘sexploitation’ cut of Seeds, titled Seeds of Sin (78 minutes). Several scenes in Seeds incorporate some brief female nudity of the late-60s drive-in sort, just enough to get one’s attention. In Seeds of Sin these scenes are substantially longer but not more explicit. The most striking addition is the opening scene of several nude couples rolling around, these more-attractive actors do not appear in Seeds, and their dialogueless scene is unrelated to the subsequent film.

The appeal of Seeds lies in unravelling the complicated incestuous past shared by a large group of half-siblings during one day of hysterical screaming and accusations. Seeds of Sin makes viewing less clear and less fun by swapping eight or so minutes of content and dialogue for stagnant montages of backs, thighs, and breasts.
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Seijun Suzuki: The Early Years Vol. 1: Seijun Rising: The Youth Movies

Seijun Suzuki: The Early Years Vol. 1: Seijun Rising: The Youth Movies. Seijun Suzuki, 1958-1965.
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Edition screened: Arrow box set, released 2018. Japanese language with English subtitles. Runtime of feature films approximately 449 minutes.

Summary: A few dicey moments with live chickens, but no particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.

The Arrow release includes supplemental materials and five feature films. See individual titles for details.


I found these early Suzuki films surprisingly entertaining and charming. Some better than others, not an outright stinker in the bunch, and all indicating the bravura filmmaking to come. The Boy Who Came Back is the least ambitious of the group but not bad. The Wind-of-Youth Group has the good-natured charm of a better Elvis movie. Teenage Yakuza is good, while The Incorrigible and Born Under Crossed Stars are downright excellent.
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Seven Green Bottles

Seven Green Bottles. Eric Marquis, 1975.
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Edition screened: Included on BFI ‘Flipside’ #13 Bronco Bullfrog, released 2010. English language. Runtime approximately 35 minutes.


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

Seven More Stations. Victor Sheridan, 1948.
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Edition screened: Included in BFI Blu-ray/DVD set Underground, released 2013. English language. Runtime approximately 12 minutes.

Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals.


A promotional film celebrating expansion of the London Underground Transportation System.
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Sex and Lucía

Sex and Lucía (Lucía y el sexo). Julio Medem, 2001.
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Edition screened: Palm/Lions Gate DVD, released 2004. Spanish language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 128 minutes.

Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals.
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Sexual Heights/Undulations

Sexual Heights/Undulations. Carlos Tobalina, 1981.
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Edition screened: Vinegar Syndrome DVD #064 Peekarama: Sexual Heights/Undulations, released 2015. English language. Cumulative runtime approximately 170 minutes.

Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals in either feature.

Sexual Heights. Carlos Tobalina as Troy Benny, 1981, 91 minutes. 4/5❤
Undulations. Carlos Tobalina as Troy Benny, 1981, 79 minutes. 0/5❤

Sexual Heights is very strange, and entertaining in that strangeness. Undulations is one of the most horrible films of this sort I’ve ever seen, but it does contain an entertaining clip of a 1980 Gay Pride parade with floats and costumes.
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Shake! Otis at Monterey

Shake! Otis at Monterey. D.A. Pennebaker, 1986.
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Edition screened: Criterion Blu-ray #169 in box set #167 The Complete Monterey Pop Festival, released 2017. English language. Runtime approximately 19 minutes.

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












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Shallow Hal

Shallow Hal. Bobby & Peter Farrelly, 2001.
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Edition screened: 20th Century Fox Blu-ray, released 2012. English language. Runtime approximately 113 minutes.

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


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Sin in the Suburbs

Sin in the Suburbs. Joseph Sarno, 1964.
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Edition screened: Included in Film Movement’s Joseph W. Sarno Retrospect Series Vol. 4 Blu-ray, released 2018. English language. Runtime approximately 90 minutes.

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













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Storm over Mont Blanc

Storm over Mont Blanc (Stürme über dem Mont Blanc). Arnold Fanck, 1930.
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Edition screened: Kino DVD, released 2005. German language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 95 minutes.

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

The Kino DVD also includes Fancks short weather-watching film Cloud Phemomena of Maloja (1924).
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Shanghai Express

Shanghai Express. Josef von Sternberg, 1932.
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Edition screened: Criterion Blu-ray #933 included in box set # 930 Dietrich & von Sternberg in Hollywood, released 2018. English language. Runtime approximately 82 minutes.

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

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Sherlock Holmes Faces Death

Sherlock Holmes Faces Death. Roy William Neill, 1943.
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Edition screened: Included in MPI The Complete Sherlock Holmes Collection Blu-ray set, released 2011. English language. Runtime approximately 68 minutes.

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

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Sherlock Holmes in Washington

Sherlock Holmes in Washington. Roy William Neill, 1943.
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Edition screened: Included in MPI The Complete Sherlock Holmes Collection Blu-ray set, released 2011. English language. Runtime approximately 71 minutes.

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

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The Shipping News

The Shipping News. Lasse Hallström, 2001.
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Edition screened: Buena Vista DVD, released 2002. English language. Runtime approximately 111 minutes.

Summary: Mild interaction with dead fish; nothing graphic or exploitive.

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Shivers

Shivers (The Parasite Murders, They Came from Within). David Cronenberg, 1975.
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Edition screened: Arrow Blu-ray, released 2014. English language. Runtime approximately 88 minutes.


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

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Short Working Day

Short Working Day (Krótki dzien pracy). Krzysztof Kieślowski, 1981.
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Edition screened: Included in Arrow Blu-ray box set Dekalog and Other Television Works, released 2016. Polish language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 73 minutes.

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


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Shot

Shot (Death Shot). Mitch Brown, 1973.
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Edition screened: Vinegar Syndrome Blu-ray #242, released 2018. English language. Runtime approximately 93 minutes.

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

A VS custom slipcover (not included in the Amazon version shown here) includes a cartooned enumeration of things destroyed in the film (two bottles, one police radar unit, etc.) concluding with ‘one dog’. Shot includes a lot of police radio talk, including the call We ran over a dog or something. The artwork must be a joking reference to this police call, as we see no dog hit by a car or otherwise hurt. 
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Shutter Island

Shutter Island. Martin Scorsese, 2009.
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Edition screened: Paramount Blu-ray, released 2010. English language with extensive whoosh! whack! Runtime approximately 137 minutes.

Summary: Leonardo DiCaprio kicks at a colony of rats, but there is no particular depictions of them being hurt.

1960 Gottlieb Seven Seas in the guards room around 1:38:00.

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Shuttle

Shuttle. Edward Anderson, 2008.
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Edition screened: Magnolia DVD, released 2009. English language. Runtime approximately 106 minutes.


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

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The Siamese Twin Pinheads

The Siamese Twin Pinheads. Curt McDowell, 1972.
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Edition screened: Included in Synapse Thundercrack! Blu-ray/DVD set, released 2015. English language. Runtime approximately 4 minutes.

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

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Signs

Signs. M. Night Shyamalan, 2002.
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Edition screened: Buena Vista DVD, released 2003. English language. Runtime approximately 106 minutes.

Summary: Semi-accidental killing of a dog.


Details: Animals are acting strangely because of alien invaders. Mel Gibson finds his children crying beside their dead German Sheppard, and the boy relates that the dog “fell” on him (and a barbecue fork) while the dog was attacking the girl. Mel Gibson scolds Joaquin Phoenix for not watching the kids, and a county cop pulls the meat fork from the dog’s neck. All of this, 9:59-11:36. Substantially later in the film we hear the second of the two family dogs being killed by aliens.

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Signs of Life

Signs of Life (Lebenszeichen). Werner Herzog, 1968.
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Edition screened: New Yorker DVD, released 2005. German language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 91 minutes.

Summary: Dead animals used for symbolic effect.

Details:
1) Insecticide applied to trapped roaches, 17:18-18:15.
2) A child recites a poem while sitting beside the head and legs of a dismembered goat, 55:56-56:39.
3) A donkey lies dead in a plaza after being shot, 1:03:45-1:03:51.
4) Another brief view of the dead donkey, 1:16:31-1:16:35.
5) The donkey is dragged away, 1:19:38-1:20:17.

Signs of Life, Herzog’s first feature-length film, contains the stylistic fortitude, visual poetry, and social ironies that would bring him fame in ensuing centuries. Signs of Life also debuts the director’s career-long impulse to include animals for meditative content and in juxtaposition to the world of Man, often living but just as often dead, as in this film.

Despite the inclusion of dead animals, Signs of Life is a beautiful, tranquil, and sometimes funny film about a soldier’s struggle to both retain and reject his sanity.
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The Silence

The Silence (Sokout). Mohsen Makhmalbaf, 1998.
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Edition screened: Included in Arrow Blu-ray set The Poetic Trilogy, released 2018. Persian language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 76 minutes.


Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to any of the animals who appear throughout this film.








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Sin You Sinners

Sin You Sinners. Joseph W. Sarno, 1963.
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Edition screened: Included with Vampire Ecstasy on Film Movement’s Sarno Retrospect Series Volume 1 Blu-ray, released 2016. English language. Runtime approximately 67 minutes.


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











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The Sinful Pleasures of Reverend Star/Kinky Tricks/China Lust

The Sinful Pleasures of Reverend Star/Kinky Tricks/China Lust. Charles Webb and Summer Brown, 1976-1977.
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Edition screened: Vinegar Syndrome DVD #189, released 2017. English language. Cumulative runtime approximately 205 minutes.

Summary: No animals or references to animals in the any of the three films films.

Vinegar Syndrome attributes all three films in this compilation to Charles DeSantos, which is one alias of Charles Webb. That doesn’t seem right, but the films aren’t interesting enough to merit a debate. China Lust is better than the other two and features footage of a Chinese New Year parade in San Francisco’s Chinatown.

• The Sinful Pleasures of Reverend Star (Star-Crossed Maidens). Charles Webb as Chuck Angel, 1976, approximately 66 minutes. 1/5❤
• Kinky Tricks. Charles Webb as Bob W. Davis, 1977, approximately 73 minutes. 1.5/5❤
• China Lust. Summer Brown as Sam Lee, 1976, approximately 66 minutes. 2.5/5❤
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