Post by Deleted on Dec 23, 2012 20:33:51 GMT -5
"Surely at the gates of heaven an all-compassionate God is not going to say, "Well, you're walking in on two legs, you can go in. You're walking in four legs, we can't take you."- Mrs. Harberts
"There's your dog; your dog's dead. But where's the thing that made it move? It had to be something, didn't it?"- Mourning Pet Owner
For the category "Strangest Film You've Ever Seen", I chose to present Errol Morris's ("The Thin Blue Line", "Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control") bizarre documentary "Gates of Heaven". "Gates of Heaven" follows the relocation of the animals from one independent pet cemetery, Foothill Pet Cemetery, to another, the Bubbling Well Pet Memorial Park, in Nappa Valley, California. Morris finds a host of eccentric if poignant pet owners and cemetery attendants who weigh in on a host of issues including death, animal rights, families, money, and growing up.
In his "Great Movies" review, Roger Ebert calls the film "an underground legend, a litmus test for audiences, who cannot decide if it is serious or satirical, funny or sad, sympathetic or mocking," and goes on to say that " When I put it on my list of the 10 greatest films ever made, I was not joking; this 85-minute film about pet cemeteries has given me more to think about over the past 20 years than most of the other films I've seen." Indeed, Gates of Heaven is a hard film to wrap your head around, astonishing for its narrative riffs, uncomfortable for the sheer weirdness of some of the individuals presented.
Floyd McClure, the paraplegic owner of Foothill Pet Cemetery, occupies the first part of the narrative, describing how he helped a friend bury a pet before a garbage truck could come and cart it away, an experience that left him with a need to furnish the resting place of other animals and an hatred of rendering plants. McClure speaks with an embittered passion about his "Kismet idea'', an idea for the Pet Cemetery which would leave him and his investors broke.
The second part of the narrative follows the Harberts, the owners of the Bubbling Well Pet Memorial Park, a couple who also founded a church that teaches that God loves animals as well as men. They are joined by their grown sons, one who has aspirations to be a rock star and another who has returned from a failed business career to ponder the rigors of animal burial "You don't want to make it too large because you don't want to waste space, and you don't want to make it too small because you can't get the thing in there.'' The would-be rock star comes out to the Memorial Park to play his music after the mourners are gone, the amp echoing among the gravestones.
A largely underground film, Gates of Heaven is strange for a myriad of reasons. There isn't a narrative per se, just a series of interviews. The material gathered is as striking as any written script I've seen and frustrates, amuses, touches, and, indeed, haunts the viewer. The highlight of the film is justly this monologue:
Why did I pick it, other than the almost freak show factor of the individuals involved, what makes it strange?
Well:
1. One can never figure out what Errol Morris is up to here. It's a true account but is it supposed to be a mockery? Does it accept the people presented? Are we to infer that these individuals and this situation represents us as a society and our views of life and death, of man and animal? Most films have a message to sum things up but it's hard to find one here. You find several about animals, about faith, about human relationships, about the living and the dead, but what is the central message?
2. Most films have a plot, with heroes and villains, with greater themes hammered home to the audience. This is a documentary that plays like reading a newspaper article in the human interest section of the newspaper, the popular weird stories that you see on yahoo about giant dogs and buildings made out of plastic bottles. The film is an entertainment and has several amazing segments, with performances that no actor could recreate but what is it per se? What's the genre?
3. Made in 1978, the film foreshadows several issues about animal rights that would become hotly contested in the years to come. What does the film ultimately say about animals? We do see animals in the film but it feels like they recede into the background. What does the film say about humans? There's a dichotomy between humans and animals that, despite the epitaphs on the graves, seems never to be resolved. The animals play second fiddle to the people that interact with them.
The film can be found at Hulu for free here:
www.hulu.com/watch/424550
Gates of Heaven's IMDB Page: www.imdb.com/title/tt0077598/
Roger Ebert's "Great Movie" review: rogerebert.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=%2F19971109%2FREVIEWS08%2F401010320%2F1023
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