One of the most talked about and controversial films at Sundance this year also turned out to be one of the biggest disappointments. The description for Zoo had Sundancers talking long before the festival even started. Slated as a documentary about bestiality, the subject of Zoo sounded unique enough for patrons to wait up to five hours in line for tickets. I in fact was one of the curious, showing up to the theater early for my chance to watch men having sex with horses. This experience however, has turned out to be my largest waste of time at Sundance yet.
The first mistake that the filmmakers of Zoo made was in choosing to record only audio for the interviews. They chose to layer these sound-bites over cheesy poorly shot reenactments which had the audience laughing out loud. It often looked as if the filmmakers simply picked out stock footage to fit the visuals produced by the interviews. In addition the interviews in this film sounded almost entirely scripted.
They also seemed to tip toe around the topic of bestiality until the end of the film as if to avoid shocking audiences. The problem with this is that audiences here most likely know what they’re getting themselves into when they choose to watch this film, and are probably expecting, and are probably even hoping to be shocked. In addition, this film comes off as very shallow, and doesn’t dig deep into the issue of bestiality, a topic which has the potential of evoking discussion on many angles. The filmmakers instead makes a drawn out one dimensional story that could have been told in under ten minutes.
The only highlights of the film come when a horse rescuer explains that she witnessed a miniature horse giving a arabian stallion a blow-job. There is also a horse castration scene at the end that proved to be quite interesting.
Stay away from this film. The filmmakers should learn that audiences aren’t made of glass. This is a controversial topic and audiences deserve a film with more depth.
/Film Rating: 2 out of 10U.S.A. / color / 80 minutes
Director: Robinson Devor
Screenwriter: Charles Mudede, Robinson Devor
January 25th, 2007 at 8:55 am
So let me get this straight.
The film sucks because it *doesn’t* have lots of footage of men having sex with horses?
I think you were looking for a different festival, dude.
January 30th, 2007 at 6:34 am
Fuccin idiots..If u think this movie is a revelation, your fuccin’ idiots..U wanna ban gangsta rap and gambling but allow a documentary to hit the big screen where it can be viewed by children..Whoever endorses it are fuccin’ idiots..and are probably part of this sicc shit.!!
February 3rd, 2007 at 1:16 pm
those who were laughing were laughing because we wanted them to laugh. not the laughter of the gums but the laughter of the idea–in the original greek sense of that word, which is equal in meaning to the universal forms beyond particular appearances. when one of the narrators who is mixing drinks and preparing for guests, horse lovers from around the world, to arrive, says: “it’s like anywhere else in america. people are doing this sort of thing every weekend.” if you are not laughing at both the connotation and the denotation of this then we are sorry that is not the case. the thing you must remember is cosmic laughter which comes, for us as artists, very close to universal sorrow. it’s sad that you are not very bright, as critic (you might be good at other things), but the film is really packed with these kinds of difficult insights.
February 3rd, 2007 at 1:18 pm
those who were laughing were laughing because we wanted them to laugh. not the laughter of the gums but the laughter of the idea–in the original greek sense of that word, which is equal in meaning to the universal forms beyond particular appearances. when one of the narrators who is mixing drinks and preparing for guests, horse lovers from around the world, to arrive, says: “it’s like anywhere else in america. people are doing this sort of thing every weekend.” if you are not laughing at both the connotation and the denotation of this then we are sorry that is not the case. the thing you must remember is cosmic laughter which comes, for us as artists, very close to universal sorrow. it’s sad that you are not very bright, as a critic (you might be good at other things), but the film is really packed with these kinds of difficult insights.
February 9th, 2007 at 12:43 pm
We are all going to hell for this crap that is passed off as ‘art’, child rape scenes and bestiality, and this is called art! Whats next for Sundance documentry about the missunderstood men of NAMBLA? These are some of the most vile unatural things, yet they wish to portray themselves as ‘artists’ pushing the boundries to the cinematic audience. Just cause you have Verdi, playing in the background (instead the loud chants of Jerry! Jerry!) doesn’t mean you are an artist!
April 19th, 2007 at 11:56 am
You actually wanted to see sex with animals? Sounds a little sick to me. The film may be poorly done, but to not like it purely because you did not get to get off watching sex with a horse makes me wonder about you and your mental abilities. There is depth and there is disgusting. Sounds like you wanted more of the latter.
May 4th, 2007 at 9:54 am
I’m looking forward to this film. I would be a bit disappointed with the lack of clear beastily scenes but i am like them, i love horses. Hate me if you will but i really don’t care.
May 13th, 2007 at 3:27 am
Charles~If you had stayed true to your account in “The Animal In You,”
(great piece) and given us a movie with some inkling into the mind of a man
driven (no pun) to his death by this practice/fetish/cult (?), maybe I would have
understood the film. Sure, sex with animals is rough subject, but who didn’t
know of this shocking event some two years ago? The disgusting video is
still making the rounds online. I just left with the same, if not more questions as
to - ‘why?’ I cannot believe there are an equal amount of people across America
either mixing drinks or having ’stall sex’ on the weekends, which too, might
have been an interesting angle. But there again, I don’t drink and never have
been around a horse, so without an ‘artists’ insight, I’ll trot along.
May 26th, 2007 at 10:39 pm
I agree with BobDucco. If we allow this, what is next. It is not natural, it’s sick. This as a film about mental illness. It’s subjects need help.
May 27th, 2007 at 1:05 am
It’s a film about a controversial subject that never really gets addressed. Who is Bob Ducco?
May 31st, 2007 at 4:34 am
Hey people,
this stufff is happening around you. ignoring it won’t eliminate it. try to educate yourselves….
June 1st, 2007 at 8:24 am
i agree. instead of calling it an illness and unnatural tery to understand it.
June 1st, 2007 at 11:28 am
There is nothing to understand this is vulgar and wrong. Are pedophiles misunderstood people, this movie tries to portray these sickos in an artsy way. I think all of you have truly lost it!
June 1st, 2007 at 6:34 pm
hardly. Pedophiles can’t help being what they are. neither can zooaplilics. feel free to impose laws against the sexual activities but then you leave them with the choice to break that law. Plus if you don’t like this stuff why bother posting comments about how sickening you find other people’s fetishes i mean talk about depressive nature
June 27th, 2007 at 1:04 am
Back in the days of Greek tragedy (even Shakespsearean tragedy), sex,violence, incest, infanticide and rape were all part of the entertainment. However, due mostly to the Hays Code of the 40’s, we now have the situatiuon where we have a PG-13 movie splattered with the most violent tortures allowed through the MPAA, any sex shots, even between puppets, is edited out, indicating that violence is normal but sex is not. A country that allows you to have a gun at age 12 but won’t allow you to see sex at any age on the screen is the sickness in society, not this film.
June 27th, 2007 at 10:37 am
How dare you compare Oedipus to this shit! This exactly why I am against this movie, because idiots like you have the audacity to compare Shakespeare and Sophocles, to this. Please go home, pull your head out of your ass, and then read the great tragedies.
June 27th, 2007 at 4:40 pm
I am home. So wipe away some of that foam and calm down… I merely meant to suggest that our current squeamishness in the face of films like the Woodsman etc. indicates that several of what we would call classical tragic scenarios have been removed silently from our dramas by a ever-repressive system that prefers us to watch outrageous tortures and not balance that with equally shocking sexual content. Look at the paintings of Otto Dix or the surrealistic films of Dali and Bunuel. Could they be made today? Most of the elements of classical drama are here with us in modern cinema but the more thought-provoking sexual edge of society is glossed over or ignored. Political correctness has robbed the teeth from melodrama’s hot lips, I’m afraid.
By the way, I haven’t seen this movie so I cannot compare it to Oedipus although i’m sure if you dig there are plenty of references to people sleeping with animals in classical literature and art.
July 14th, 2007 at 11:58 am
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July 14th, 2007 at 1:06 pm
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December 20th, 2007 at 3:27 am
i am looking forward to this film
i am waiting for you Zoo!
^-^
January 15th, 2008 at 8:36 am
Why is this the “last taboo”? Why is this seen as worse than anything else? What about rape or child molestation? What about husbands who beat their wives and kids? After reviewing all the evidence in this case, police couldn’t find a single example of abuse toward the animals. Sure it’s damn weird and gross, but then the animals were not harmed and this guy only hurt himself. He made his own decisions and paid the price. He didn’t hurt anyone else. In the grand scheme of things, I am less morally offended by this harmless nut than by the countless “normal” heterosexual men who disrespect women and treat them like objects.
June 20th, 2008 at 8:39 pm
i wept, i laughed, i shat. this film was a revelation. i give it 5.3 houses (4 houses 2 condos, a lakehouse and a town home) out of 6.