In three of this fall’s buzziest films, the role of man’s best friend goes to a donkey — which makes it even sadder when each humble animal winds up being the recipient of violence. The one in Ruben Östlund’s scabrous satire Triangle of Sadness is heard before it is seen, delivering a series of nightmarish yawps that terrify the film’s castaways on a desert island so much that they flee for safety. When they discover it’s only a donkey, the tables turn. One jackass is no match for a lifeboat full of them.
Martin McDonagh’s The Banshees of Inisherin gives us a donkey as a scene-stealing supporting player. Colin Farrell stars as a farmer in 1920s Ireland who is distraught that his buddy (Brendan Gleeson) has inexplicably ended their friendship. Farrell begins to lean on his pet donkey, even going so far as to let the animal roam freely inside his cottage. All that tramped-in straw makes a mess, yes, but a good friend is hard to find. As for the donkey’s fate — you don’t need to be an expert in Irish history to know that internecine feuds tend to inflict the worst on those who least deserve it.
The more prominently featured each donkey is, the more anthropomorphic it becomes: The highest-profile one of the season is the eponymous protagonist of Jerzy Skolimowski’s EO, Poland’s Oscar submission. EO — say it aloud — is a circus performer “liberated” from the big top; the donkey is forced into an underground fur mill, comes perilously close to being turned into salami, and winds up as the mascot for some local soccer ultras who make EO drink beer. Further violence and despair await. EO doesn’t talk, but the donkey’s mournful gaze is all that’s needed for an empathetic lead performance.
If horses are the movie stars of the animal kingdom — beautiful, temperamental, fussed over — donkeys, then, could be the character actors: not always pretty but full of personality. Their dismal outcomes in these films underscore their directors’ brutal view of existence.
