''Blood of the Beasts'' (''Le Sang des bêtes'') is a 1949

short Short may refer to: Places * Short (crater), a lunar impact crater on the near side of the Moon * Short, Mississippi, an unincorporated community * Short, Oklahoma, a census-designated place People * Short (surname) * List of people known as ...

French

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...

written and directed by

Georges Franju Georges Franju (; 12 April 1912 – 5 November 1987) was a French filmmaker. He was born in Fougères, Ille-et-Vilaine. Biography Early life Before working in French cinema, Franju held several different jobs. These included working for a ...

. It is Franju's first film and is narrated by Georges Hubert and Nicole Ladmiral. The film is a special feature on

The Criterion Collection The Criterion Collection, Inc. (or simply Criterion) is an American home video, home-video distribution company that focuses on licensing, restoring and distributing "important classic and contemporary films." Criterion serves film and media scho ...

DVD for Franju's '' Eyes Without a Face'' (1960).

Synopsis

Franju's film contrasts peaceful scenes of Parisian suburbia with scenes from a slaughterhouse. The film documents the slaughtering and butchering of

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million yea ...

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus ''Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult ma ...

, and

sheep Sheep or domestic sheep (''Ovis aries'') are domesticated, ruminant mammals typically kept as livestock. Although the term ''sheep'' can apply to other species in the genus '' Ovis'', in everyday usage it almost always refers to domesticated ...

. The film is narrated without emotive language.

Production

Franju states that he wasn't interested in the subject of slaughterhouses when he decided to make the film, but the location around the building was the

Ourcq Canal The Canal de l'Ourcq is a long canal in the Île-de-France region (greater Paris) with 10 locks. It was built at a width of but was enlarged to 3.7 m (12 ft), which permitted use by more pleasure boats. The canal begins at Port-au ...

, allowing him to make a

. Franju stated by using a documentary film format, he was able to use both locations as lyrical counterpoints and "to explain it as a realist while remaining a

surrealist Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...

by displacing the object in another context. In this new setting, the object rediscovers its quality as an object".''Eyes Without a Face'' (1997; DVD, The Criterion Collection, 2004). The film marked the debut of documentary photographer Patrice Molinard who took stills during the shoot. ''Blood of the Beasts'' was made as a black and white film as an aesthetic. Franju states "If it were in colour, it'd be repulsive... the sensation people get would be physical one."

Release

''Blood of the Beasts'' had no commercial release outside of Paris.Ince 2005, p. 155.

Awards

* Grand Prix International du Court Sujet 1950Le Sang des bêtes (Georges Franju)
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Notes

Bibliography

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External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Blood Of The Beasts 1949 films 1940s French-language films French short documentary films Films directed by Georges Franju Documentary films about animal rights 1949 documentary films Black-and-white documentary films 1940s short documentary films French black-and-white films 1949 short films Films scored by Joseph Kosma 1940s French films