The life story and work routine of a cow on a livestock farm are the stars of this documentary by Andrea Arnold.
Closer to Franju’s ‘The Blood of the Beasts’ (1949) than Kossakovsky’s ‘Gunda’ (2020), ‘Cow’ is the life of a macro-farm cow told by herself. The most admirable thing about Andrea Arnold’s documentary is her work on point of view: the camera attached to Luma’s body, at the height of her bovine gaze, subject to human exploitation, in a labyrinth of unnatural metal corridors. From a rigorous treatment of subjectivity, Arnold humanizes this cow with no future to make her story a tragedy.
The director of ‘Fish Tank’ (2009) and ‘Wuthering Heights’ (2011), so prone to harsh lyricism, observes Luma’s day-to-day as she did with her previous heroines, chained to a system they don’t understand, longing for a freedom that they identify with nature. The Bressonian donkey of ‘Al azar, Baltazar’ (1966), who contemplated the miseries of the human with the clear gaze of a martyr, becomes here a ruminant who suffers plainly, who only has eyes for the sad life that awaits him , who does not feel sorry for anyone; which is, in short, our own image crushed by capitalism that animalizes us.
For those who want to be cows for a day and suffer a lot.
DATA SHEET
Direction: Andrew Arnold Original title: cow Country: United Kingdom Year: 2021 Release date: 08–04-2022 Gender: Documentary film Duration: 94 min.
Synopsis: It immerses us in the vital trajectory and work routine of a cow in a cattle farm.
Source: Fotogramas
Camila Luna is a writer at Gossipify, where she covers the latest movies and television series. With a passion for all things entertainment, Camila brings her unique perspective to her writing and offers readers an inside look at the industry. Camila is a graduate from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with a degree in English and is also a avid movie watcher.
