Toronto Film Festival To Show Film on Cat Killing

Subject: Toronto Int. Film Fest. to screen "Casuistry: The Art of
Killing a Cat"

Greetings,
IDA has learned that the Toronto Film Festival plans to screen
"Casuistry: The Art of Killing a Cat" during their "Real to Real"
program. This film glorifies atrocities committed by three youths in
2001
when they videotaped themselves skinning alive a domestic cat and
called
it art. Several of the police who watched the videotapes had to stop
watching; some of them cried.
The three youths were all given slaps on the wrist and are now out on
the
street today capable of committing further atrocities.

Below please find the column that appeared in the Toronto Sun, (also
available at
http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/Column...el/2004/08/28/
605479.html).

What you can do:

Please write to Toronto Film Festival Officials and let them know that
you are disgusted.ツ Tell them you are boycotting the festival if this
film is not pulled.
Contact: Lynnette Gryseels, Press Officer Michele Maheux, Managing
Director Toronto Film Festival E-mail: [email protected];
[email protected]; [email protected];
[email protected] Tel.: (416) 934-3200 Fax: (416)
581-0214

Sample letter:
To the organizers of the Toronto International Film Festival:

I was horrified to learn that Linda Feesey's film, ・廚asuistry: The
Art
of Killing a Cat,・・is scheduled as part of the Toronto Film
Festival.As you likely know, the film discusses the notorious case of 2001 in
which Jesse Power, Anthony Wennekers, and Matt Kaczorowski videotaped
themselves torturing a cat.
We would welcome efforts to raise awareness about this act of cruelty.
However, you may not be aware that the producer, Linda Feesey, is an
associate of the cat torturers. (For example, her 2002 film, Mr.
Kafka's
Holiday, starred Jesse Power's friend Jubal Brown, who was outspoken
in
his support of Power during the cat video case.) Casuistry is another
opportunity for Power and his friends to defend their horrendous
actions.
According to the review in the Toronto Sun, the film features many
apologists for the cat torturers. The killers show no remorse for
their
crime.
By including this film in the Festival, you are not only condoning, but
encouraging Jesse Power and his ilk in their actions of extreme,
premeditated, and illegal cruelty to animals. We urge you to remove
this
film from your program. Please let me know as soon as possible what
action you will take. Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely, _______
Monday, August 30, 2004 COLUMNIST Sat, August 28, 2004 It gets even
loopier

By MIKE STROBEL -- For the Toronto Sun
Casuistry: (1) The act of deciding questions of right from wrong. (2)
Clever but false reasoning.
And here we thought the Kensington cat snuff film was evil, pure and
simple.
That we were right to revile the three goofs who made it and be
repulsed
by their work. That nothing, nothing, could justify it. Now along
comes
Casuistry: The Art of Killing a Cat. It premieres at the Toronto Film
Festival Sept. 14. The producer gave me a tape, since I wrote about the case.

You need not be a cat-lover to remember: Jesse Power, Anthony
Wennekers
and Matt Kaczorowski, all 20-ish, made a snuff film one Friday night
in 2001.
For 17 minutes, they tormented, tortured, and oh, so, slowly, killed a
gentle, striped female cat in a Kensington house. The unlucky pet was
later found skinned in a beer fridge. It was art, said Jesse Power,
the
lead goof.

A few of Toronto's loopier artistes defended them, but hardly anyone
else
did. I mean, this was the Bernardo/Homolka of animal cruelty cases.

Now, at last, the Three Stooges have their say. Casuistry: The Art of
Killing a Cat is produced by Linda Feesey and directed by Zev Asher.
She
made Sex and Cerebral Palsy. He made What About Me: The Rise of the
Nihilist Spasm Band. They are not Disney.
To set the mood, they open Casuistry with scenes from a 1980
"performance
art" flick, in which two cats are disembowelled and worn as hats.
Istvan
Kantor filmed that gem. He has since won a Governor General's Award.
But
Jesse Power is the star of Casuistry. (It's his special word, right
before "cat" in the dictionary.) He's even the soundtrack, yowling his
Anti-Meat Eating Song. He speaks first in shadow, then, as he warms to
the topic, in full view.
His bangs dangle sexily. His eyes toy with the camera. "Man, am I
charismatic," they say. "And misunderstood." And a whiner. The cops
"went all righteous on me." Or, "I never got to eat the cat, but a lot of
other
people are feasting off of this cat."
Or, things got gory because he and his pals were "disorganized" and
one
of them gave him a dull razor. Plus they were dozy on drugs. And,
anyway,
"everything takes a long time to die, no matter what it is." He got 90
days, on weekends. He blames the papers, and society, and the young
woman
who called the cops (in hopes of a reward, says our Jesse).
Pal Wennekers even manages to blame cats, "just a smarter version of
rats, an artifact of human culture." Sometimes, bull-fights or
squealing
swine flash across Casuistry. Remember, Power's "art video" was to
show
the "hypocrisy" of pets in a world of abattoirs. And, step right up,
see
Jesse Power chop off a runt chicken's head. See him cuddle a rotting pig,
play puppet with a baby orangutan's corpse. There is none of the
Kensington tape.
The filmmakers couldn't get their hands on it. They also couldn't find
any backers, even in usually fertile arts councils and grant offices.
Total budget was, oh, $500. Apologists were a dime a dozen, though. A
friend of Matt's tells us how the guy is a talented writer and once
asked for a teddy bear. "Artists" say things like: "Young men, as they'regrowing up and learning how things work, they always kill something.
It's
part of growing and developing as a young person." Det. John
Margetson,
the humane society and the like, bring some balance and sense, thank
goodness. "I cannot condone, or condemn, what (Power and Co.) did,"
says
Zev Asher, down the line from Montreal. "I think it was a misguided
adventure, that they were inebriated and did something sick and
stupid.
"I think Jesse is an artist. I don't think this was art at all, though
I
understand what he was trying to do." I dunno. You should see those 17
minutes, Mr. Asher. I have. So when Jesse Power smirks that maybe
he'll
be "torn apart by a cougar" when he goes camping...it's hard not to
root
for the cougar.