A movie no dialogue or narrator? What is limited to following the day to day of a cow? It’s not a joke, but the latest audiovisual project of Andrew Arnold that walks between the documentary, the costumbrista drama and the intimate cinema to give rise to something unique and risky. Its titled ‘Cow’ (‘Cow’) and it has come to us a year after its premiere at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival.
the secret life of cows
Luma is a normal cow, with a normal life. Throughout the film, We will accompany her from her birth and we will observe her whole life: how she relates to other cows, the day to day on the farm, the birth of her baby, the treatment that the farmers give her…
Andrea Arnold, director of ‘American Honey’ and the second season of ‘Big Little Lies’ (controversy included) takes a triple somersault with his first foray into the documentarywhich in approach is reminiscent of ‘Gunda’, the documentary by Viktor Kossakovsky starring a pig.
Unlike the usual documentaries, ‘Vaca’ lacks a narrator and the only thing we hear in its hour and a half of footage it is the distant voices of the farm staff and the mooing of the cows that, surprisingly, seem to say much more than the unintelligible chatter of their owners.
Also check the direction, although static and contemplative, in line with the desire to show a history of customs. At the same time, Arnold often looks for closed frames close to Luma, as if it were an intimate film, achieving a emotional impact on the viewer as unusual as real.
We hardly see the humans, everything is concentrated on the cows and we see through Luma’s subjectivity, who seems to be aware of the tragic passage of time, just a blink in the life of an animal raised on a farm whose reason for being is always at the service of humans. This is built through the ellipses that jump from one moment to another of the character’s life to show that global view of it.
arnold you don’t need words to verbalize a speech which is present in almost every frame. His cold vision of life on the farm does not omit the less pleasant face of it, a thesis that he synthesizes without grandiloquence or concessions.
We’re not going to fool anyone either: ‘Vaca’ isn’t exactly a roller coaster with a fast pace, so if you’re looking for strong emotions, it’s very likely that it’s not the best option. However, if you like stories with a calm and naturalistic rhythm, that through the daily life of a person (of a cow, in this case) gradually builds an intimate drama sprinkled with social criticism, you can come closer to see life through the eyes of Luma.
‘Cow’ is available at Filmin.