Casa de Carne

A couple of months ago I posted a blog article called The Watch List where I recommended some vegan-related films you might want to check out. One of the entries was a short two-minute film: Casa de Carne.

Live Kindly, a vegan website, claimed that “this short film will turn you vegan in two minutes”.

Live Kindly are way too optimistic.

But I wanted to test their theory. So I did this…

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I guess I should now tell you about the film. First and foremost it has no bad images so it’s safe for anyone to watch. If you’d like to watch it then click here otherwise I’ll tell you what happens…

Three friends, presumably a couple and a single guy, Eric, are dining together at a restaurant. The couple have dined there before. Eric orders “baby back ribs”. He is then led to the back of the restaurant, given an apron that he puts on and then handed a knife. It is indicated he should enter a room. The room is empty except for a pig. Eric tries to leave the room but the door is locked. He crouches down and the pig approaches him. Eric nuzzles the pig’s chin. He stands up and drops the knife (on purpose). An alarm sounds. Two workers enter the room, they seem agitated and say to one another “another one”, indicating that Eric was not the first person to choose not to kill the animal. They flip the pig on to his side and the camera cuts to Eric looking scared and traumatised in the corner. We can hear the pig struggling. One of the workers shouts “you gonna do it?” and Eric stammers “no” and repeatedly pleads for the workers to stop what they are doing. The camera cuts to a plate of ribs being served. Eric is sat at the table looking sweaty and distraught. The couple return talking about how awesome their experience was. They then ask Eric how he found the experience? The video ends.

So I was interested to hear the non-vegan opinion on this film and whether it could live up to Live Kindly’s claim. I had a plan: Ask the participants some questions. Let them watch the video. Then ask some more questions.

Instead of labouring you guys with every single detail, I thought I would only mention some interesting points here. If you want to know more then you can find all the questions and responses here.

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To get straight to the big question… The video made no one go vegan.

Live Kindly was WRONG. I might email them to complain.

Almost half of the participants said that they would consider going vegan.

All of the participants said that they would not want to dine at the restaurant featured in the film.

Woohoo!

The majority of participants said that the reason they would not dine at the restaurant was because they wouldn’t want to see a live animal or be a part of the killing of the animal.

Five participants commented that they thought that if we had to kill animals to eat meat then most of us wouldn’t eat meat anymore.

Both of these points indicate that there is a real disconnect between killing the animal and eating the animal.

Half of the meat-eaters and pescatarians said the film made them think about their attitudes towards eating animals.

Let’s hope they are still thinking!

Only one participant out of all of the participants said they would not consider reducing the meat in their diet.

This is super encouraging that the majority are so open to reducing their animal consumption.

Three participants commented that they would not be willing to totally give up meat.

I would be very intrigued to explore this further.

Several participants commented that although the film was good, the message could have been stronger.

I agree!

Two participants made negative comments about the couple in the film.

I found this super interesting because I hadn’t initially noticed the couple at the end. When I watched again I noticed that they looked demonic.

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This blog post is getting way too long so I’ll end it here. I am super, super grateful to all of the participants that volunteered their time as I really enjoyed talking to you all.

If you’ve watched Casa de Carne, let me know what you think of it in the comments section. I’d be very interested to hear your opinion.

Thanks for reading! 💚