The Adventures of Milo and Otis : The backdrop to an apparently innocent film...

If you grew up in the 80's and 90's like me, you may have seen a feature film called The Adventures of Chatran. Originally called Koneko Monogatari, due to its Japanese origin, or The Adventures of Milo and Otis for the Anglo-Saxon public, this feature film directed by Masanori Hata, a zoologist, writer and filmmaker at the same time, made the joy and wonder of an audience that was quite young at the time of its theatrical release in 1986. The film was rehabilitated by Columbia Pictures in 1989 for the Western audience. Amputant by the same occasion, fifteen minutes of rush coming from the original work.

An initiatory journey of a young kitten and her friend Pousquet, a young dog of the Carlin breed, Chartran's adventures present themselves as an adventure film with a childlike and innocent appearance. Although I'm starting to miss my well-packed 30-year-old memory, I still remember with a bit of emotion this fortuitous discovery, during a viewing I was able to make on Canal+ (french pay per view channel), during my very young years. Candid and not very observant, in spite of the particular attention paid to the cathode ray tube, I particularly liked the film on the whole. It wasn't until a few decades later, when a sudden urge to dive back into Chartran's unexpected expedition once again, that I realized that something was not right.

Proust's Madeleine Syndrome

At that time, the available means and special effects set up by the film industry did not allow for as many possibilities as now. This was more a matter of craftmanship than anything else, although the illusion given to the viewer was in a more than credible sense, without using and abusing the famous synthetic images. It was with a bit of hindsight and by focusing my attention on the original Japanese version that my innocence as a young boy took a serious blow of slack... How can a frail feline feline survive all the dangers of his perilous adventure? Did they play with impunity with my naivety as a child, for the sole purpose of offering visual entertainment?

Since removed from the European and American versions, some scenes contained in the original version are intriguing to say the least. Thus giving a vision of the whole much less engaging or one clearly discerns the permanent endangerment of the protagonists. In the end, it is more like a perpetual struggle for survival and the animals present here are forced to participate, for the sole distraction of the person behind his screen... After I reached the closing credits, I felt like I had been cheated. I didn't dare believe in so much cruelty until I decided to do some research on it.

A bestial production

Indeed, after a few minutes of wandering the net, disillusionment gave way to disgust and horror. It turned out that according to an investigation by the Animal Liberation Queensland, an association for the defence of animals located in Australia, has identified the use of no less than twelve kittens to ensure the proper functioning of the waterfalls. However, no communication is made regarding the integrity of the animals. Nevertheless, it can be inferred that there were losses and abuse when one sees the fall (caused) of a kitten from a fifty-metre-high cliff or when one of them ends up with a broken leg for the needs of the scenario. Although the studio in charge of supervising the project (Fuji) assures that it has not breached these rules of professional ethics, it does not mind that one quickly notices the deception at the sight of certain catches. Here is an anthology of atrocity, which I have grouped together for you in video. The aim is not to engage in voyeurism but to denounce totally inhuman acts. Sensitive souls, please abstain !

Here are the lists of unspeakable acts according to David McMillan, one of the investigators responsible for submitting a report to the Australian authorities:

*A mother cat and her kittens are exposed to a large snake. The mother cat and the snake fight, the snake strikes out at the mother cat. The film-makers cut away.

*A dog and an angry bear are pitted against each other. The dog puts up a valiant fight, but is clearly out of its league. The bear wacks, throttles and crushes the dog. The film-makers cut away.

*A kitten is seen limping through the wilderness with an apparently broken paw.

*A kitten is placed on the back of a large packhorse and is dangerously buffeted as it clings on for dear life, its tail sticking straight up in alarm.

*A kitten or cat is placed on a cliff in the middle of a large pack of aggressive nesting seagulls, who mercilessly attack it from all sides. The film-makers cut away.

*A kitten or cat is thrown from a 50metre+ cliff into the ocean. This cat does his utmost to survive; he hits the turbulent water and immediately starts swimming for dear life. He makes it to the rocks where the cliff meets the sea and starts climbing back up the perilous cliff. Halfway up, he slips and falls back into the ocean. The film-makers cut away. It is clearly another soaking-wet cat who we see safely on the beach in the next scene. Gee I wonder what happened to the first cat? (With absolutely no supporting evidence, and with zero credibility, defenders of the film suggest a Star-Wars-style blue-screen special effect was used here. This is so improbable, I almost didn’t want to mention it, except that it shows the extremes of passionate denial in which the film’s defenders are prepared to indulge.)

The cat and dog are chased by angry cows in a field. The dog seems to go under the cows’ hooves. The film-makers cut away.
A crab and a kitten are pitted against each other. The crab’s pincers fasten onto the cat’s lip and nose, viciously.
A cat is sent down the rapids of a raging river in a flimsy little box while Dudley Moore drunkenly jabbers, “Oh dear me! Oh my! Goodness!” The cat is terrified. The box goes over a small-to-medium waterfall, with the cat inside. This cat seems to have survived this part of its ordeal, in a great deal of vocal stress. The box continues down the river. The film-makers cut away.

Source : http://www.animalsmattertoo.com/articles/miloandotiscruelty.htm

The end of recklessness

I'm not going to linger any longer, because I'm still stunned by these revelations. Anyway, I would never again see Chartran's adventures with the same eye. Part of my childhood is now tainted by the guilt of having appreciated a work that did not care much about the well-being of its participants... I would like to believe the opposite and appreciate it once again. Only, given the facts and their credibility in front of the camera, I now think that I just attended a children's snuff movie...