No Animals Were Harmed: Hollywood monitors safety of animal actors

Long before Al Pacino made it big, before Meryl Streep acted in a single movie, and before Ryan Gosling was born, the American Humane Association was busy looking out for animals on movie sets, according to the website americanhumanefilmtv.org.

Protection of animal actors
Using established guidelines, on-set monitoring, movie ratings and reviews, the American Humane Association’s film and TV unit helps protect animal actors. As the only animal welfare organization sanctioned by the Screen Actors Guild, the unit monitors more than 2,000 filmed productions annually, both domestically and internationally, keeping the public informed of which movies are the most ‘humane.’

The rating system runs the spectrum from “Not Monitored,” “Monitored Unacceptable,” “Not Monitored – Production Compliant,” “Monitored Acceptable,” and “Monitored Outstanding.”

The majority of recent films like The Campaign, The Dark Knight Rises, Ted, The Vow, and Magic Mike all received a “Monitored Outstanding” gold star for excellent treatment of animals, which means that staff was on set to ensure the safety of the animals throughout production. After screening the finished product and cross-checking all animal action, the association determined the film met or exceeded their guidelines and awarded the famous end credit disclaimer “No Animals Were Harmed.”

Behind the scenes with animal-loving directors and cast
Animal and film lovers can also watch brief behind-the-scenes videos of the director and actors from recent popular recent movies like War Horse, We Bought a Zoo, True Grit and Eight Below, courtesy of the No Animals Were Harmed.

HBO series reports accidental deaths of several horses
The “Monitored: Special Circumstances” rating received by the HBO series Luck starring Dustin Hoffman meant the production followed the guidelines and cooperated with the protective measures enforced by the safety representatives, however an accident, injury or death involving an animal occurred during the course of filming. A full investigation revealed that the incident was not a result of negligence or malice.

In the case of the HBO series about the horse racing industry, the fatal accidents occurred several months apart – two horses stumbled and fell during short racing sequences, each resulting in a severe fracture where the most humane course of action was euthanasia. Upon the death of a third horse, HBO cancelled the series in March 2012.

Dead fish and underage kittens
The rating “Monitored: Unacceptable” indicates that the filmed production failed to follow the guidelines or disregarded animal safety, leading to improper animal safety and directly caused the injury or death of an animal.

Men in Black 3 received the rating due to an incident that occurred before the association reps arrived on set. In one scene, several large aquariums had been overfilled with fish; several fish were already dead and more were dying. The reps immediately set about rectifying the situation, however it was too late to save all the fish.

Moonrise Kingdom received the “Monitored Unacceptable” rating due to the use of an underage kitten. The association was never notified us as to which days the kitten was used and so unable to enforce guidelines for the safe handling of the kitten. The lack of notification, coupled with the unintentional negligence of using a kitten under eight weeks of age, led to the decision to rate the film “Monitored: Unacceptable.”

So the next time you go to the movies, you might want to doublecheck that the production treated its animal actors well before handing over your hard-earned money.