As we approach the crunch time to the project I discuss with you today what exactly I intend to achieve through this project and what exactly my focus is and how through the influences I’ve had I will bring these ideas to life.

“You could cover the whole earth with asphalt, but sooner or later grass would break through.”

Ilya Ehrenburg

This quote isn’t a direct motivation as to why I began my endeavors to film long grass however I believe it is symbolic to the way we view grass and growth, in our world which in suburban areas is a concrete jungle we often forget about nature and its growth, however when you cover a planet once filled with natural beauty and then one day that natural beauty finds a way to grow back it’s an epic phenomena. Much like how a field of grass reflect Mother Nature itself, it flows with the elements, changes color with the light, moves wildly in the wind, lays ever so peacefully in the dawn of a new day, and is naturally pure and wonderful and poetic.

In a world where natural beauty is hard to come by and we often get trapped and lost for inspiration I find some of the greatest inspiration is quite simple. If you look at the movements in a field of long grass you can reflect and watch every separate strand move independently then in a mammoth breath of fresh air move as one, it could mean anything but to me it’s a reminder of just how beautiful nature is and when you’re out in the element, in rain, hail or shine, thousands of emotions are conveyed through just one field of grass.

One film that is poetic and is filmed so beautifully is the Days of Heaven by director Terrance Malik this is a film told as a screen poem about life in America at the turn of the century. A story of love and murder told through the voice of a child and expressive images of nature in 1916. What is so impressive about this film is Malick’s use of natural light and shots expressing the beauty of nature and mans relation with the elements.
There is a scene in Days of Heaven when Malick depicts nature in such a poetic way that it takes the narrative far beyond what was originally intended in the smaller confines of the narrative. There was a scene in the film that stood out to me as a plague of locusts storm the wheat fields. The bursts of orange in the night are staggeringly beautiful, and at one point Malick notices and chooses to dwell on a locust on a stalk of corn with the contrast of fire and night making the image. It’s almost as if one of the ranch hands desperate to save the ranch’s crop had suddenly stopped in his efforts and his hostility to the locusts and said: “wow, have you ever really looked at a locust before, and just sat and admired it? They are amazing and so beautiful you feel there must be some design in their making. The extreme close up of the locusts are pristine, you can see them in exquisite detail and their presence blended with sound effects (foley sound) and the farmers spread across the field desperately trying to save their crops are both eerie and spine tinglingly beautiful.

The plot is full of tragedy, loss and separation, and of a briefly glimpsed paradise that cannot sustain human shortcomings. But heaven is there in the light on the grass, in the romantic aura of a house and in a few people in a place where there is no one else. This is what amazes me the most, despite tragedy through nature and through the cinematography in this film wonder, beautify, tranquility and true sense of heaven is portrayed through the long grass at the peaceful time of dusk where it is at its most symbolic best.

Malick is interested in the interplay between man and the natural world in this film. Although the open plains and vast panoramas provide a marked contrast to the dirty poverty of industrial Chicago, we are reminded that, for all its beauty, the farm is also an industrial landscape. It is a landscape in which man and nature collide and have to share the space.

The panoramic shots of the massive harvesting machinery in action and the detailed depictions of men and machinery laboring together to gather in the natural bounty reinforce this idea. But perhaps the most forceful image is of an old-fashioned tractor driving through a wall of flames, symbolic as it reminds me of  black beast moving through hell at a rapid rate it is truly fascinating it almost demonizes industrial machinery and man made creations and shows the inevitable downfall of peaceful once untouched nature.
But equally as man may try to control this nature, Malick reminds us of our own insignificance. He does this not only through a major nod to the power of nature, but also through a clear depiction of the cycle of changing seasons in the wide landscapes of wheat and just how vast that land really is.

This is all enhanced by an almost obsessive desire to capture the glorious light of an impassive, immortal sky. The relationship between the expansive wheat fields and the expansive skies is beautiful and inspiring for my project. If you have a small figure running through the grass with a large colorful sky and a huge expansive field spanning over the horizon, it makes any life in the field, insignificant, it places the person as a small piece of a huge and never ending universe of beauty and wonder. Unlike many film-makers, Malick (and his cinematographer Nestor Almendros), wherever possible attempted and succeeded in using natural light to film their masterpiece. Days of Heaven was largely shot in the hour preceding dusk, the so called “magic hour” when natural light is at its most beautiful and at this time you are faced with some of the most incredible colors coming from the sky but also from each separate strand of grass.

This made filming rather long as the shooting time each day was severely limited, but the results are spectacular. Experimentation, it seems, is part of the search for perfection and by pushing the accepted boundaries of film-making, Malick gets to his goal. Thus inspiring me to do the same in my project. It is all about achieve some sort of perfection watching and moving with a field as it encounters all the elements, I’ve seen rain, hail, and glimpses of glorious sunshine glimmer across the field, it expresses so much emotion and when I eventually bring my subject in, like the Days of Heaven it will explain through cinematography and sequences of shots, her relationship to nature.

In Days of Heaven the sky seems to provide a glow over the film, like a reminder of an alternative power. One might even describe it as God, if that’s what you believe it represents, in the films reflective nature does make you question from one of the most simplest of locations some of the universes most complex thoughts.
Natural light in Days of Heaven used almost exclusively by Malick serves to give the film a very realistic look and also to give it the rose-tinted wash of memory. Since most of the film also takes place outdoors, it somehow takes us back to childhood summers, to carefree days in the sun. Through the girl running through the field it takes us back to our days of innocence though the times where every thing in nature was noticed and appreciated, everything seemed dreamy and wonderful and where you moved with the elements and became a strand in a field which would grow, move with the times and become a symbol of peace. Linda’s narration of the events also makes it clear that she is telling us this story. We see it unfold through her immature eyes, which explains the almost fantastical elements. Is my film through the eyes of girl? I will leave that up to the audience the camera captures the subjects experience wandering through the field, walking with a spirit, moving with Mother Nature.

In Days of Heaven the audience are constantly reminded that they are watching a story told through the filter of a small girl’s eyes and understanding doesn’t stop them from feeling the tragic outcome of the tale. The audience are at once inside the story and removed from it. Much like my experiments we see the worlds through the eyes of subject walking through the beauty of nature, through the changes of music and camera angles through the sequences it places the audience in different positions to view the action. The music turns to a dark, ominous, uprising tambre where the girl in a tracking shot from behind may be in danger, being followed… this change in soundtrack and angles can change the meaning of a sequence of shots. Whereas if the girl is being tracked from behind, with light, glittery, pleasant piano and strings as she in slow motion runs through the grass, it’ll depict a peaceful and beautiful scene where a girl flies a kite through a large field filled with dreams and adventures.

Malick is telling the audience about a small world but he is also telling us about the whole world. And a great deal of this telling is done without words. The dialogue is kept to a bare minimum, sometimes giving the film a silent-movie feeling and yet the characters are complex, the acting nuanced. My sequence of shots do not rely on narration rather they rely of the audience to interpret two different sequences of shots whereby a girl runs through the grass, once seemingly in danger and another occasion assumably having a joyous time flying a kite, exploring in her own little sacred world full of adventures and beauty. Long grass with natural light letting natural element move and shape the story is a form of poetry, many impressions and meanings can be understood through nature and I intend to show the beauty of long grass with Mother Nature combined with humans relationship with nature and the meanings the two bring together when combined.

I am excited through my experiments to capture a large field of long grass and through the elements display with wonderful and expressive cinematography a small narrative where a subject prances in her own world in a dreamy environment filled with meanings that go beyond just a beautifully lit field of grass, the possibilities of narrative are endless and the meaning expressed through mother natures destructive and nurturing force cannot be undermined.

Below is a scene from Days of Heaven, most of the scenes from the film I was explaining originate in this piece of footage, admire the cinematography, the detail on the long grass and the locusts and admire the use of natural light when capturing a large expansive field. This clip is inspiring and the way it has been filmed is the way in which I am going about filming my own film experiments. Enjoy.

Michael Serpell