Ruminating on Ruminants
Human hubris has long persuaded us that we are kings of the natural world, that we have dominion over all other creatures. But modern science can now observe and interpret the emotional reactions and social interactions of other animals and has concluded that creatures as alien as the octopus and as despised as the lowly rat possess high intelligence and form complex relationships.
Award-winning filmmaker Michel Negroponte is not a scientist but he is a sensitive observer. In 2021 his world was broadened when a herd of shaggy Belted Galloway cattle was moved onto a farm neighboring his property in Livingston Manor NY. His fascination with the animals deepened during daily visits.
At a crossroads in his career, Negroponte turned his camera’s lens on the cattle, following them through a calendar year and recording the “personhood” of the animals as they revealed themselves to him. The effort resulting in his video “essay,” a 60-minute-long award-winning film, Herd, that he will screen at the Norfolk Library on Saturday at 5:30 PM. The screening will be followed by a question-and-answer session with the filmmaker.
What Negroponte learned through his intimate association with the animals is that each has a distinct personality, that the animals are sentient with a social hierarchy and a desire to support and protect other members of their herd. He began to question mankind’s right to dictate their fate. Negroponte's essay film is equal parts rumination, observation and meditation.
In a 2022 video interview with Adam Shartoff on Filmwax TV, Negroponte said, “We’re very distanced from animals, that’s our way to ingest them without thinking about it.”
But he has clearly thought about it. His film opens with the Hindu saying, “Who dies if cow lives? Who lives if cow dies?”, a statement of reverence for the cow as the foundation of India’s society. He describes Herdas “gentle, upfront and up close.”
He explained the genesis of the film. “After making films for 30 years that were portraits of people on topics such as mental illness and drug additions, I came to the point where I was entirely spent. I landed in a black hole and needed to move in a new direction.”
When Covid tightened its grip on the nation, the Negroponte family moved to its Catskills home. “We get moved in directions sometimes in ways that are unexpected,” he said. “I was in a new and different place and wanted to do something radically different. I wanted to work on essay films, personal meditations. I am trying to find a subtly different way to tell stories.”
In the process, he closely observed bovine interactions, how they negotiated their social landscape, resolved arguments, offered support when another gives birth and fiercely protect their young. He learned their personalities, discovered that some were giddy, others reserved and some wise herd leaders. Some of the animals became his friends, while others never let him approach.
“It took me a long time to climb that fence because Bufford (the bull) would greet me,” he recalled. “Bufford was unpredictable. Bulls are highly protective, and he charged me a couple of times—a 2,000-pound bull saying, ‘Get lost.’ I would keep an eye on Bufford because Bufford was keeping an eye on me.”
Even the cows were hesitant. Two days after the herd arrived, a tiny calf was born. The owners named her Michele after the filmmaker. He said that dairy cattle have closer relationships with humans because they are handled all the time while beef cattle roam freely, making them skittish.
“It took six months before I could touch Michele,” he said. “Now, she comes right up to say hello. We kiss and hug but she’s a big girl. Cows are gentle but they use their heads in remarkable ways, to nudge, to ask for attention. There are times when they have come up to me to say hello and they swing their heads and can knock me off my feet.”
Occasionally, he says, he feels like a rock star when visiting the herd. “I sit on the ground and the heifers circle me. They lick my face and hair and I feel like a Beatle with all these girls.”
At other times, they clearly told him he was intruding. He was waiting to film the birth of a calf when one cow went into labor. He was there in the driving rain on a cold day to film the event.
“The birth was premature and intensely dramatic,” he reported. “The other cows sensed it. This cow was one of the ones that were less friendly. The first thing she did was charge me. It was like a Buster Keaton film. I stepped behind a tree. She would go to the right, and I would step left. The she would go to left and I would step right. She was really pissed off at me.”
But when the calf was born, he was fascinated with the way other mothers and the heifers gathered round to help with the baby.
“Though the film is called ‘Herd,’ it’s also a film about people,” he said, concluding that humans are “a very nasty virus” in the animal kingdom. Negroponte contemplates the “herd mentality” of humans with footage of Hitler and Ghandi. Their ideas of evil and non-violence set a balance for the film.
When Michele, the calf, was born, his thoughts turned to the children’s book, Ferdinand the Bull. “I start to research Ferdinand. My father read it to me when I was a child and I realized he knew it well. It was written in 1939, just before the Spanish Civil War and I didn’t realize how controversial it was. Ernest Hemingway hated it because he thought it encouraged passivity. Hitler also hated the book but Ghandi loved it.”
“I like the fact that the film doesn’t have a neat narrative,” he concluded. “I wanted it to be a meandering journey of ideas.”
During his long career Negroponte has earned numerous awards, including an Emmy for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Documentary. His films have been broadcast in the United States on PBS, HBO and the Sundance Channel as well as in England, France, Germany, Spain, and Japan.
Herd won an award for Best Documentary at The New Jersey International Film Festival and Best Documentary and Best Cinematography at the Choice International Film Festival.
Register here for the Norfolk program.