A video has surfaced showing a dog being treated poorly while on the set of a new film, “A Dog’s Purpose.”
The video shows the dog being thrown into a pool, despite his efforts to get away, while others on set encourage the behavior. The video ends as the dog seems to be underwater, and crew members yelling to cut the video.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), made a statement on this video.
“Please pledge to avoid contributing to this cruel practice by not buying tickets to ‘A Dog’s Purpose’ or any other movies that use live animals,” they said.
The boycott, along with the video that has surfaced, caused the premiere of the movie in Hollywood to be cancelled.
Birds and Animals Unlimited (BAU) has been cited as being the organization that lended the animals for “A Dog’s Purpose.” BAU provides animals for a variety of movies and television shows, like “Game of Thrones” and “Pirates of the Caribbean.” They have also been suspected of treating their animals in harsh conditions, and considering the aforementioned video, that’s not necessarily a surprise.
According to PETA, an eyewitness who worked at BAU documented “chronic neglect, including sick and injured animals who went without adequate veterinary care, filthy enclosures, and animals who were denied food so that they would be hungry when being trained to do tricks.”
The American Humane Association (AHA) is one of the organizations that determines whether or not a film treats the animals with care, and the monitor for this organization that was with the movie has been put on leave after this video has surfaced.
The AHA has guidelines that films should follow. Some of the main principles are that no animals can be killed or injured for the sake of a film production, that animals are not props and that no animal can be treated inhumanely for the sake of a performance. The last guideline goes directly against the video that has surfaced from the movie.
The person that was assigned to “A Dog’s Purpose” by the AHA did not do their job properly, and that might not bode well for other films treating dogs with respect and care. “A Dog’s Purpose” should be a movie about how dogs should be loved, but now it will be thought of as a prime example of what filmmakers should not do: treat animals badly.