Camilla Calamandrei's impressive second film harkens back to an older form of documentary, one that is reportorial in form and refuses to take sides. She painstakingly presents the facts, interviews virtually every side of the issue, and leaves it up to the audience to make up their minds. In this age of documentaries that are more interested in polemics that careful analysis, "The Tiger Next Door" is a refreshing throwback.
Her subject is the growing trade of breeders of lions, tigers, cougars and other large felines. As the number of regular people owning these exotic, dangerous animals has increased in recent decades, so has the reckless dissemination of these creatures to people not fit to keep them properly. The result is malnourished and mistreated animals, made to live in cages far too small for them, indiscriminate breeding of cubs to make a profit, accidental injury or death of human caretakers, and in the worst cases slaughter and harvesting of the animals' carcasses for meat, skulls and skins.
The subject is Dennis Hill, a veteran breeder from Flat Rock, Indiana. He is quite a character, with long white hair and a beard so untamed it completely covers his mouth, so you can't see his lips move when he talks. He is thoroughly independent, someone who's carved out a life by rules of his own making, and he resents any imposed on him by the government, or anyone else. He has a pioneer spirit wrapped in the trappings of a hippie.
Dennis has more than 20 large felines at his farm, and as we first meet him they seem well cared for. The cages are small, but big enough for them to move around in. We observe him cutting up 2,000 pounds of turkey meat with a power saw to feed his cats every week. He also has an undeniable rapport with these huge animals, nonchalantly strolling into their cages and petting them like friendly tabby cats.
But Dennis is being threatened with shutdown by the authorities. His federal breeding license has been revoked due to some poor conditions, and Calamandrei shows the Indiana Department of Natural Resources video that shows cages with huge gaps in the walls, and a rain-soaked tiger sloshing through a muddy cage. The state has ordered him to give away most of his animals, with a public hearing for his neighbors to voice their opinion about whether he should be issued a state license. So the film is structured around the 30-day deadline Dennis has to find new homes for these lions and tigers, and the forces -- pro and con -- gathering for the hearing.
Is Dennis a bad guy? Even the state officials who regulate his farm decline to say so. Rather, Calamandrei points to the broader issue of allowing non-professionals to own large felines. One expert talks about the psychology of hoarding -- people gather more and more animals out of a desire to protect them, and come to believe that no one can care for them as well as they. Dennis freely admits that he is probably guilty of hoarding, but he does it with 500-pound cats instead of 10-pound ones.
Right at the beginning of the film, we are smacked with some jaw-dropping figures: There are now more tigers in captivity than free in the wild. Half of the 50 states allow residents to own tigers without any special qualifications.
"The Tiger Next Door" examines the larger issue by focusing on a single case, and shows how the problems that exist on the micro level -- Dennis breeds cats to sell so he can continue to support his existing ones, leading to a never-ending cycle -- have an impact throughout the country, and the world. This little Indiana story has plenty of bite.
4.5 Yaps