Animal Cruelty...

I found it disturbing listening to the DVD commentary track where Schrader describes how the Asian leopard they used for the scene where the panther goes crazy in the hooker's motel room bashed its head in for real against the bars - and they had to put it down. They bought the leopard from some animal dealer who was going to euthanize the cat because it was overly aggressive - yeah, well, it's a wild animal, what the F do you expect? They should have just released the leopard back into the wild or settled her on some preserve. I've always liked this film a lot, but knowing this leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth. Schrader also came across as very cavalier about the leopard smashing its brains in for the purposes of being riled up in the scene.