
Zoo
In July 2005, a man named Kenneth Pinyan died from internal injuries sustained at a farm outside Enumclaw, Washington, after having sex with a horse. Charles Mudede and director Robinson Devor use that death as the entry point into a stranger story: a loose network of men, reachable online, who traveled to the farm to take part in what they called "zoo." Rather than reenacting the acts themselves, the film builds its account from the voices of participants, investigators, and neighbors, layered over hazy, impressionistic footage of the farm, the highway, and the Pacific Northwest countryside at night. Interviews are often shot from behind or in shadow, keeping identities obscured while letting the men explain, in their own words, how they arrived at this. The tone stays quiet and unhurried, closer to a mood piece than a crime report, and the film is more interested in isolation and secrecy than in shock. It won a Special Jury Prize at Sundance for its visual style.