ANIMALE (France/Belgium/Saudi Arabia 2024) ***
Directed by Emma Benestan

In the Camargue region of the South of France, there remains an infamous, long-standing tradition of bullfighting. Local youths participate in the elegant yet dangerous challenge, practicing a modernized version of the sport that seeks not to kill the animals but rather to showcase agility and dominance. Among them is Nejma, an intrepid twenty-two-year-old with dreams of one day winning the annual competition. The only woman working on the cattle ranch, she trains tirelessly to prove herself equal among the men, both in and outside of the arena. The ranchers share a deep respect for the bulls, though when a loose bull threatens the community of riders and young men begin turning up dead, a hunt to find and kill the creature begins. Nejma fears for the bull, beginning a dark, mysterious transformation of her own. The sophomore feature of French filmmaker Emma Benestan,  ANIMALE is “a brutal disorienting horror fable burning with feminine anger.

The bullfighting scenes in the rink are exciting and marvellous to watch.  It must not only be dangerous for the actors but also for the camera crew to get such candid shots as well as close-ups at the bus charging at the bull experts as well as they dodging the bull.  The bull carries two white tassels and if a tassel is removed, there is a huge prize money involved.  But the bull can also be injured as in one scene where Thunder (the name of the bull)is hurt and has to br brought back to the pen.  

The film is shot in the Southern French coastal region, the Camargue, which is where the director grew up and was raised. The course camarguaise, the form of bull running seen in the film, originates from there and is practised in many villages.  It is different from what the world knows as the other type of bullfighting, known as the corrida, in which the bull is killed.

The director is female and stresses the male-oriented nature of the sport seen on the screen.

The characterization of Nejma comes with a few problems.  The story obviously should’ve had the audience rooting for her, for her female stance and the love of the bulls.  But as she acts crazy, the audience does not end up rooting for a crazy person, and reacts opposite to how the story should feel.

The rogue bull attacking humans and the demand of the public to shut down the shows and restaurants feels something right about Steven Spielberg’s 1975 JAWS.  But the audience is on the other side of JAWS; the audience wants the shows and restaurants opened, despite the rogue bull having to be found and killed.  This is one of the problems of the film - the conflicted emotions of how the audience should feel and react.

The story plays with myth, horror and reality.  The transformation of a human into an animal is the type seen before in werewolf films and in CAT PEOPLE.  The credibility does not always work as the film plays more in reality than in mythical mystery.

ANIALE is available Digital/DOD August 8th.

Trailer: