Horse Opera

The camera surveys country life – often through a circular aperture against a black background. Sometimes a turkey comes into view, sometimes a deer, sometimes the edge of a roof weighed down by snow; but the camera likes to look at horses most of all, piebald horses, white horses, chestnut-colored horses with red eyelashes, ponies with thick winter coats. It shows tails and rumps in close-up and is also interested in how their withers quiver. A slow voice is also heard, often in voiceover, reading out texts. They’re about parties in New York, about drugs, about dancefloor exuberance, about being amazed by other people’s great outfits, about the insecurity of not knowing how to move your body to a song. Every now and then, a woman in her 60s appears onscreen. Anyone with an idea of what Moyra Davey looks like will know it’s her.

A halting voice, pulsating parties, images of rural isolation, texts about conviviality, the older body and the hungry, young bodies: HORSE OPERA lives from contrasts, from images and sounds that diverge, from interference. Almost in passing, the film brings the melancholy to the fore generated by the pandemic years and the waning of physical abilities. (Cristina Nord)