Movie Month: The Animal by Walter Ungerer

Vermont International Film Festival and Shelburne Museum present The Animal, directed by Walter Ungerer. 75 minutes. 1976.

Shot in Vermont and digitally remastered by Vermont Archive Movie Project (VAMP) in 2018, The Animal established Ungerer as a leading experimental fiction filmmaker. VAMP is a program of Vermont International Film Festival (VTIFF) whose purpose is to locate, catalog, restore, and make available Vermont films.

A woman waits for a man at a deserted railroad station somewhere in northern New England. It is the middle of winter. Snow is falling. The two drive to a remote farmhouse. Later two strange children appear at the window, and an old woman summons them away. Isolation, then alienation overcome the couple. The woman has a dream which comes true. She disappears. Nothing is explained. Only footprints remain in the snow that covers the supernatural landscape.

Introduced and followed by a discussion with the filmmaker, Walter Ungurer, moderated by Steve Bissette, cartoonist and professor at The Cartoon Studies Center in White River Junction and author of Green Mountain Cinema.

$15 ticket, $12 for Museum and VTIFF members, $12 for Seniors, $5 for students with valid I.D.