One of the most charming themes of 2022’s best movies was one of the cutest too: the humble, beguiling donkey. A full handful of donkey-centric movies are up for top prizes at the Academy Awards this year, including the beautiful, devastating, totally unexpected tribute to the donkey, “EO,” which is up for best international feature film and arrived on the Criterion Channel Tuesday.
“EO,” which won a jury prize at the Cannes Film Festival back in May, is directed by the 84-year-old legendary Polish filmmaker Jerzy Skolimowski, and is the brain child of Skolimowski and wife Ewa Piaskowska, his co-writer on the film. “EO,” which boasts incredible cinematography by Michal Dymek and an engrossing score by composer Pawel Mykietyn, follows the harrowing odyssey of a donkey named EO after he’s liberated from performing in the circus. But the world he finds on the outside is one that is sometimes welcoming, often beautiful, but also incredibly harsh and dangerous. As much as “EO” is a tribute to the gentle creatures and animals of the natural world, it is also a study in the chaos and absurdity of humanity, and it makes for a profoundly moving portrait of the world, through one animal’s eyes.
The “EO” page on the Criterion Channel includes a portrait of the six donkeys who portrayed EO, a making-of featurette and three of Skolimowksi’s early films as well.
