BEAST AND FEAST
25 min, video, 4k, 2023
In the backdrop of mounted police rallies, a central protagonist knits together a narrative; a female police officer hunting for a perfect police horse. Her psychological torment and idealization of this perfect horse are then made terrifyingly real as she eventually starts a transformation into the horse she desires. Fiction scenes are mixed up with archive footage from recent riots and turbulent situations where police horses are utilized weapons to engage in crowd control.
Josefin Arnell’s campy blend of B-Movie gore and shaky-cam realism, Beast and Feast follows the inner and outer dramas of its main protagonist, police officer Annina. Juggling many things, she is a single mum navigating a sometimes overwhelming life. Annina wants to fit in, to feel the love and validation of the police, i.e., her colleagues. Gradually she becomes fixated on the perfect horse as the singular solution to her torments and discomforts. To find her way, or at least, her horse, Annina must undertake a series of quests: to deal with emotionally abusive co-workers and fight the stable girl aka life coach to the sound of Stina Fors’ ‘Baby Girl’. Intoxicated by Baby’s farts, she goes through sulphuric hell (the chicken house aka the womb). Will she live up to our, and her own, expectations?
Arnell’s Beast and Feast navigates cycles of violence, employing characters in shifting positions of power over another, wherein the abused may become the abuser, shunning the narrative formula of stable ‘good’ protagonists and ‘bad’ antagonists. Here, the police horse, or horsegiirL’s happy hardcore ‘little white pony’, stands in for the ultimate symbol of a living being co-opted and coerced for power. When the public is orderly, it is an approachable interface, and when the public is not, it is here to intimidate and crowd-control you. Shot in a breeding stable for Arabian horses, revered for their beauty and stamina, while Arnell was pregnant with her firstborn, the filmic environment is a stage for pent-up fixations – impossible desires for one thing to sort one’s life and ‘correct’ the world.
Text by Adomas Narkevičius
Commisoned by Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem, Netherlands.
Additional Support by Mondriaan Fonds and Stichting Niemeijer Fonds
Full credit see below
Installation view of Beast and Feast at Frans Hals Museum, 2023
Curated by Manique Hendricks.
Wood coutouts, wood bed, denim textile, wall print 2x9meters, light strings.
Installation view of Beast and Feast at Cell Project space, 2023 for the exhibition - brave and pathetic is better than drawning in shame. A duo show with Max Göran curated by Adomas Narkevičius.
Photo by Jonas Balsevičius
FULL FILM CREDIT:
Written and Produced by - Josefin Arnell
Director - Josefin Arnell
Director assistant - Levi van Gelder
Director of Photography - Anna Spanlang
Production assistant - Kleoniki Stanich
Head of Technical team - Lukas Heistinger
Second Camera - Matteo Casarin
Sound recording - Vitalij Kuzkin
Sound engineering - Vitalij Kuzkin
Music - HorseGiirl, Cristina Negoita, Stina Fors, Artiom Riamson
Edit - Josefin Arnell
Contributing editors - Lukas Hesitinger, Eoghan Ryan
Color grading - Anton Zimerman
Farts SFX - Paula Garcia Sans
Costume designer - Leila El Alaoui
Assistant Set Design Manual special effects - Heleen Mineur
Assistants/Runners - George McGoldrick, Ruperto Herrador, Irene Donatini, Annie Goodner
Titel design - Edgar Walthert
Police Officer - Annina Machaz Stable Girl - Netti Nyganen
Baby - Mercurio Gannini Verdecchia Police - Shantelle Palmer
Police - Daniel Vorthuys Police - Antonella Fittipaldi
Victim - Geri Fako
Girlfriend - Fernanda Libman
Murderer / Boyfriend - Federico Petrini
Party Guests: Elisa Agterberg, Renee Riebeek, Pennie Key, Reem Dada Witness / Girl - Rosa Senese
Chicken man - John Rinaldi, Girl in nightmare - Anna Davina
Thank you: Lukas Heistinger, Eveline Calis, Zenith Arabians stable, Melanie Bühler
Dana Lissen, Anna Maria Pinaka, Manique Hendricks, ROZENSTRAAT – a rose is a rose is a rose
Commissioned by Frans Hals Museum 2023
Additional Funding: Mondriaan Fonds, Stichting Niemeijer Fonds