Regarding the review: I can't put a lot of weight on a review by someone who doesn't know that a steer cannot impregnate a cow, as, by definition, a steer has been castrated. I'm pretty sure they meant bull.
I grew up on a farm where we raised our own beef and lamb and chicken; it never ceases to amaze me how many people have no real concept of where the liquid in that plastic milk carton or the meat under that cellophane comes from, have never spent more than a few minutes, perhaps at a petting zoo as a child, around farm animals, and imagine that the animals are just like them and have all the same feelings and hopes and dreams.
Does the film maker or reviewer imagine that other similar animals...say deer or elk, live a better life in the wild? Constantly under the threat of death by starvation or predation? Having no shelter at all in severe weather and no friendly farmer providing them with food during the lean times? Do these people really think that cows...animals that have been specifically domesticated as livestock...would be better off if we just left them alone?
Or maybe they think we should provide them with luxury condominiums with wall to wall carpet and HVAC systems? (I wonder if they're going to be the ones to volunteer to clean the cow pies out of the carpet).
The whole premise is just silly. The idea that you can gain an understanding of the "life of a cow" by sitting comfortably in a theater for two hours watching a contrived, edited and produced video that, no matter how insistent the reviewer is that the director wasn't trying to make a political point, is inescapably colored by the biases and opinions of the director during editing. It would be impossible for it NOT to be. Every editorial decision about which cuts to leave in and which to take out, in what order and with what background "mood" music is colored by the opinions and biases of the director, whether intentional or not (and I would wager it's very intentional).
The most beautifully filmed and edited propaganda piece in the world is still just propaganda.
Regarding the review: I can't put a lot of weight on a review by someone who doesn't know that a steer cannot impregnate a cow, as, by definition, a steer has been castrated. I'm pretty sure they meant bull.
ReplyDeleteI grew up on a farm where we raised our own beef and lamb and chicken; it never ceases to amaze me how many people have no real concept of where the liquid in that plastic milk carton or the meat under that cellophane comes from, have never spent more than a few minutes, perhaps at a petting zoo as a child, around farm animals, and imagine that the animals are just like them and have all the same feelings and hopes and dreams.
Does the film maker or reviewer imagine that other similar animals...say deer or elk, live a better life in the wild? Constantly under the threat of death by starvation or predation? Having no shelter at all in severe weather and no friendly farmer providing them with food during the lean times? Do these people really think that cows...animals that have been specifically domesticated as livestock...would be better off if we just left them alone?
Or maybe they think we should provide them with luxury condominiums with wall to wall carpet and HVAC systems? (I wonder if they're going to be the ones to volunteer to clean the cow pies out of the carpet).
The whole premise is just silly. The idea that you can gain an understanding of the "life of a cow" by sitting comfortably in a theater for two hours watching a contrived, edited and produced video that, no matter how insistent the reviewer is that the director wasn't trying to make a political point, is inescapably colored by the biases and opinions of the director during editing. It would be impossible for it NOT to be. Every editorial decision about which cuts to leave in and which to take out, in what order and with what background "mood" music is colored by the opinions and biases of the director, whether intentional or not (and I would wager it's very intentional).
The most beautifully filmed and edited propaganda piece in the world is still just propaganda.