The Cow

While watching The Cow, I was intrigued by Hassan’s love for his cow, and the villages love for Hassan. Hassan loved his cow more than anything and everyone in the village knew it. When the cow died everyone knew that Hassan would be sick with grief so they all got together to come up with a plan for burying the body and telling Hassan that the cow ran away.  They knew that Hassan would still be upset, but they felt that it would be better to tell him she ran away than to have him walk into the barn and see his lifeless cow. This intrigued me because it showed a sense of unity within the village. Hassan wanted to protect his cow and the people in the village wanted to protect Hassan from the pain and guilt of losing his cow.

One of the things I found memorable about the form of the film was that there was not a lot of dialogue spoken. There were many scenes of people in the village or of Hassan with his cow when there was no dialogue or no subtitles. It seemed as if the director felt so confident in the actions and emotions of his actors that he felt that words were unnecessary. For the most part, I would agree. When Hassan was washing his cow in the beginning and later when he was in the barn feeding her, there was no dialogue and yet no one would doubt the love Hassan had for his cow because it was clear in his actions and emotions.

I do believe that the author’s psychological views resonate with the film, namely when Mehrjui states “Hassan and his cow are one soul in two bodies” and that once the cow dies “Hassan becomes both himself and his cow- two souls in one body” (Mehrjui, 125). For me, this put Hassan’s actions at the end of the film into perspective. This also gives new light as to why Hassan loves his cow so much and why he begins to think that he is the cow by the end. This idea was clearly depicted in the film in the way that Hassan mirrored the cow’s actions.  Hassan washed the cow, then washed himself. He fed the cow hay, then ate some himself. The cow slept in the barn and so did Hassan. If looking it this from the viewpoint that the cow and Hassan are one soul in two bodies, then it would come as no surprise that when the cow died, Hassan would die soon after as well and that is exactly what happened.