THE MOO MAN - QUEERGURU

You so know you are at SUNDANCE when you dash from seeing ‘SIGHTSEER’ where a couple on on touring vacation just annihilate anyone who upsets them in the slightest, to straight away catching ‘THE MOO MAN’ a charming documentary about a rather disarming farmer who is completely besotted with his cows who he hopes will save his farm’s future. Both movies take part in the British countryside but that’s where the similarity ends, although they both clearly show how wonderfully diverse and idiosyncratic UK film making remains.

Middle-aged Steve Hook has taken over the running of his family’s farm from his father and has decided that the only way to avoid having to close like the majority of farms in the country, he will become more self-sufficient. And with his small of some 55 cows he will stop selling his milk to be pasteurised by the supermarkets at a enormous loss, and try his hand at selling it direct to the public as raw organic milk. He’s rather an enterprising man, taking his wares to sell at local Farmer’s Markets and actually re-introducing something long gone, a door to door milk delivery service.

To make this all work he needs the cooperation of his cows which he names individually and nurtures more like a family than livestock The relationship with this exceptionally likeable man and his cattle is wonderfully as he refuses to fence them in or even herd them around the farm but beckons them all by name. To the most part they seem to patently ignore him and just amble into the farmyard for milking at their own accord.

For a man who makes his living off the land, Steve is remarkably emotional about his ‘girls’ and when they give birth to a bull calf instead of taking them to the abattoir as is the norm with a dairy herd, he keeps them and raises them. When one of his favorite cows is not long for this world, country born-and-bred Farmer Steve finds it impossible not to shed a tear.

Without any narrative or a lot of ‘action’ besides a few cows giving birth with the camera a tad too close (for me) there is a not a great deal happening on this wonderful swathe of marshy farmland in Sussex, in this particularly stunning part of the UK. Yet some how there is something completely compelling about watching this compassionate and insightful man safeguard his families future in such a well-considered way, and with such abundant humor.

The breed of cows Steve has a life expectancy of six years, but his live from nine to ten years, and after seeing this wee gem of a film, you’ll understand why.

P.S. I know some of you will believe I may I have steered to one too many pastures new with my liking this, but its very infectious and very difficult not to like. Where it will surface after Sundance is anyone’s guess, but I will keep tracking it, and will update this whenever I can.

★★★★★★★