Cow, from British filmmaker Andrea Arnold (Fish Tank, American Honey), saw release around the same time as Pig and Dog, narrative features with one-animal titles starring Nicolas Cage and Channing Tatum, except her similarly-titled film is a narration-free documentary. In that sense, it marks a deviation from her film and television work to date, which revolves primarily, but not exclusively, around working-class women in precarious situations.
Arnold begins with the birth of a Holstein calf. In a tight close-up, cinematographer Magda Kowalczyk captures each stage of the process from the emergence of the calf to its first taste of mother's milk. Almost immediately, farm workers separate the calf from its mother, Luma, who stares at the camera and moos plaintively. Though Arnold doesn't anthropomorphize in any obvious way, Luma seems pretty unhappy about the situation--even if she's experienced it several times before.
After a thorough milking, Luma and the calf briefly reunite before farm workers separate them again, presumably for good. As dairy cows, it's the life into which they were born. For four years, Arnold follows both as they lead separate lives.
From then on, the calf gets milk from a rubber nipple, rather than from its mother. Though Park Farm, a family-run operation located in northern Kent, seems more ethical and less mechanized than some, there are scenes that are difficult to watch, like the sequences in which farm workers tag the calf's ears and cauterize its horns with a hot iron--without the aid of anesthetic--or when a veterinarian conducts a gynecological exam on its mother.
Though Arnold avoids subtitles, the hands and feet of the farm workers often enter the frame, along with the occasional face. Diegetic music on the radio, from folk rock to neo-soul, provides the closest thing to a score, next to the ambient sounds of shuffling, slurping, and mooing. Amusingly, Mabel's 2019 single "Mad Love" plays as a bull gets frisky with Luma. Shortly afterward, the veterinarian conducts an ultrasound to find that she's pregnant again.
On occasion, Luma gets to romp in the sun and feast on the grass, but her days start to grow shorter. By the end of the film, she's moving more slowly and less steadily. Kowalczyk often focuses on her big, dark, soulful yet inscrutable eyes.
Since Arnold imposes no overt meaning on her imagery, she provides more space for viewers to draw their own conclusions. Her empathy certainly shines through, though Luma's life of indentured servitude seems sadder than not. Beyond birthing and milk production, she serves no use to the farm, and when she can no longer do these things, her life is effectively over.
If it isn't obvious at the start, she's not so different from the women Arnold has been making films about since her 1998 short Milk, which also involved a childbearing protagonist in a less-than-ideal situation--but with a greater chance of escape.
Can this film be used in a library education program?
Cow would provide an intriguing choice for library education programs about animal welfare.
What ages would this documentary be suitable for?
Due to some disturbing imagery, Cow is suitable for adults and older teens.
Why should an academic librarian or professor request Public Performance Rights for this film?
Cow's absence of narration creates space for students to generate their own meanings, sparking contemplation and conversation. Film professors might also find it useful as an example of cinéma vérité or observational cinema.