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TIERISCHE LIEB, aka ANIMAL LOVE (1995)

Filed under: Imported

My favorite Henny Youngman joke: "My father was the town drunk. Usually, that's not so bad, but New York City?"

I bring it up because that's how I felt when I saw the following blurb on the cover of this DVD: "Never have I come so close to looking directly into Hell." Now, that's the kind of dark hyperbole you might get from any number of fellow filmmakers, but Werner Herzog? That would be similar to seeing a film being labelled "Worst Movie Ever" by Ed Wood Jr.

So I had to see it, and now that I have, I feel confirmed in a belief I've long held-- among other bad things, Hell will be filled with assholes who can't control their pets. (One of the most harrowing scenes is a loose Doberman chewing a leashed-and-muzzled one, while the two idiots who own the wild one scream and punch at it to no avail.) Director Ulrich Seidl has found a collection of down-and-outers who all love their critters far too much.

Unless the subject is on the move, the film is done with static shots that, put together, look indeed like a talking portrait album from Hell. Here are a few of my favorites.

1) This guy and his buddy live in an apparent hole in a hill in an auto-junkyard. They take their pet rabbits to the subway station and beg for carrot money.


"Three months after I was born, I was found in a dumpster. That's how my great life began. So, I live here now." (Note the rats helping themselves to leftovers.)

2) These two are shown in a series of cinematic blackouts that parallel the fat guy's own state of blotto-ness, as he gets drunker and more abusive to the woman, who's either his wife or mistress-- he hates them both. Despite their squabbles, they dote on their pet ferret, and fixate on who might have hurt it. (It comes out later that the guy might have done it himself.)

"Its whole rear-end is busted. What shithead did this? That sucks. Whoever did this is my enemy."

3) These two maniacs, the owners of the out-of-control Doberman, are arguably the stars of the show, mainly because of tender scenes like this.


4) Possibly the only non-grotesque in the cast, and you wonder what such a beauty is doing in this film . . .

until she calls in her Siberian Husky. Fortunately, the camera looks away while it's still foreplay.

Posted by Steve Monaco at February 16, 2005 5:54 PM

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