Summary
Official Selection of Sundance Film Festival. A heart warming, tearjerker of a movie about the incredible bonds between man, animal and countryside.
Official Selection of Sundance Film Festival. A heart warming, tearjerker of a movie about the incredible bonds between man, animal and countryside.
Andy Heathcote and Heike Bachelier's follow-up to their charming fishing-tackle treatise, The Lost World of Mr Hardy (2008), is an equally perceptive insight into the state of British agriculture. The subject of this moving but never sentimentalised profile is Sussex dairy farmer Stephen Hook, who, infuriated by the trading practices of the supermarket chains, makes a living by selling his unpasteurised milk on the doorstep and at markets. While maintaining his herd of cows is a full-time job, and costs - he has to install new bottling equipment - don't come down, Hook also insists on a humane approach. From keeping the baby bulls that many competitors would slaughter at birth to keep down costs to naming each cow (he is closest to 12-year-old Ida, his "poster girl" that he takes on a photo shoot) Hook's relationships with his cattle gives the film a genuinely affecting poignancy. Cogent but restrained in its politicking, The Moo Man contains plenty of wit, wisdom and compassion, as well as much bucolic charm.
role | name |
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Steve Hook | Steve Hook |
role | name |
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Director | Andy Heathcote |
Director | Heike Bachelier |