GUNDA

VICTOR KOSSAKOVSKY ON HIS EXPERIMENTAL, WORDLESS DOCUMENTARY ABOUT A PIG

IT’S EXTREMELY MINIMALISTIC

Russian filmmaker Victor Kossakovsky has been trying to make Gunda, a non-fiction film about a pig and her piglets, for years, but struggled to have his vision understood. “It’s very difficult to achieve: a 90-minute film without words, without music, without voiceover,” he says. “All documentaries immediately put voiceover on. Excuse me! I don’t need your opinion — I need your eyes.”

IT’S A HYMN TO VEGANISM

The idea first came to him as a boy. “When I was four, I spent a couple of months in the countryside,” he recalls. “We took a onemonth-old piglet inside the house. He became my best friend. And then he became food for my relatives.” This led him to become “the first vegetarian in the Soviet Union”. Though the film takes an unromantic view of the animals, its finale makes its position clear. Kossakovsky doesn’t expect converts. “Cinema is cinema,” he says. “I cannot change the planet. I’m not United Nations. I can just give you emotional possibility for good tears.”

IT HAS JOAQUIN PHOENIX AS EXECUTIVE PRODUCER

When Phoenix won his Oscar for Joker, he gave a stirring speech for animal rights. Recognising a kindred spirit, the filmmakers sent Phoenix an early cut of the film. “He called me immediately, saying: ‘Wow, finally someone made it! Not filming a slaughterhouse — but filming from the [perspective of] animals.’”john