"There is, in Peaux de vaches, the first film of Patricia Mazuy, something which knots itself between three beings (a man, his brother, his wife) and which can no longer be undone. Here's the knot: the exchange of guilt, for which there is a sacrifice (Spiesser, while setting fire to the farm and his herd to collect insurance money, inadvertently kills a tramp, and it's Stevenin who has just spent ten years in prison for him). All of this-the country, the land, the farm, the agricultural work-could have become a classic melodramatic French-style t.v. movie. But even if Mazuy grasps something which is very deeply anchored in French country life, stylistically the film still casts a sidelong glance more toward the western (the story in flashback, the construction of the space) or even Soviet film (the sky, the machine). Finally, Mazuy films feelings that one rarely films so directly in front of the camera: frustration and jealousy, but also shame, unease, and shyness." -Marc Chevrie (condensed) Cahiers du Cinéma