No Animals Were Harmed: The Unique Perspective of “White God” | Features
Yet all of this staged suffering is in service of a profound thematic purpose: to show what animals endure at the hands of humans. Think of the film as “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” crossed with “The Incredible Journey”. When thirteen-year-old Lilly has to move in with her father, she brings her dog Hagen along with her. Like most children of divorce, Lilly has a close bond with her pet, which gets put to the test. When faced with a fee instituted by the city for mixed-breed dogs, her father instead cruelly abandons Hagen on a street corner. Heartbroken, Lilly sneaks off to look for him, while Hagen tries to learn the rules of the streets. Food and shelter are relatively easy, but human cruelty is his greatest threat.Some simply try to capture or kill him; another sells him to a dog-fighting ring, where he suffers systematic torture and abuse to toughen up him before a big fight.
Like “Rise of the Planet of the Apes,” “White God” is told mostly from the animals’ perspective. Lilly is our guide for the first section, but when her father abandons Hagen, the narrative shifts to the dog’s perspective. “Apes” uses a similar technique, although the shift is more gradual; over the course of the film, Caesar becomes the protagonist, and James Franco’s scientist character fades into the background. Shifting perspectives is a risky technique because it can make the audience uneasy, but in these films it reveals an activist intent. When the protagonist shifts from human to animal, it allows viewers to see them as equals.
The relationship between humans and animals is always changing, but we seem to be in a period of particularly rapid transition at the moment. The rise of internet activism, especially the release of undercover video investigations online, has led to increased scrutiny over the use of animals in factory farms and experimentation. It is no surprise that these discussions have found their way into our films (even Cinderella is an anti-hunting advocate now), both onscreen and off. For years, the American Humane Association’s end-credits disclaimer was enough to keep most animal lovers assuaged that the furry onscreen talent went unharmed, but as the animal welfare movement has grown in the U.S. over the last decade, their future use in entertainment has become unclear.
