Although there is no narration or manipulative music track, Denis Côté's long-take documentary look at Parc Safari in Hemmingford, Quebec, screams out (quietly) on the side of animal rights. Filmed mostly in winter, when the paying crowds are away, this film shows a bestial prison of stunned, anxious, and alienated-looking animals, mostly from warm climates, who have nothing to do but pace about their walled-in pens. The buffaloes don't roam, horned elks stare into space like zombies, a frightened monkey clings tight to a ragged teddy bear. Côté's point is well made. There is little reason for him to cut away in the middle to a taxidermist at work, showing that stuffed animals look little different from the living-dead ones in an outdoor zoo.
