It's a beautiful film, the camera lingering on the gorgeous scenery and the daily rhythms of life on a sheep farm. The acting is consistently excellent and understated and the story is engrossing. It is however very depressing and Gaby's passivity becomes wearing for the viewer. There seems to be no hope at the end for Gaby and with other of his elderly farming neighbours taking the decision to sell their farms, there seems little hope for the future of sheep farming either.
I seem to watch a lot of films about sheep farming. You might be interested to check out my reviews for:
Cycle - a Turkish film about a sheep washing contest
Vivan las Antipodas - a documentary that includes a section on a Chilean sheep farmer
Off the Beaten Tracks - a documentary about a Rumamian sheep farmer
Le Quattro Volte - an Italian film about charcoal making and farming (though it's goats rather than sheep)
As ever, red text contains hyperlinks that take you to other pages where you can find out more.
It's sad to see all the small farms disappearing along with that way of life.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds as a very engaging film although that hopelessness in a character and situation reminds me too much of Thomas Hardy who is anyway right: "It's life" but we do not need much to be reminded of that I feel, it's already too evident...sometimes we just need to be shown a "soaring" against all odds...
ReplyDeleteHmm, melancholy pastoral themed films, involving sheep and goats. There's one called 'Une hirondelle a fait le printemps' about a young woman who quits her city job to be a goat farmer and, guess what, her trouble with the local old men goat farmers who grumble about the decline of their traditional way of life etc. There was also a recent French documentary film about transhumance that was on at a local film festival round here but I didn't get to it and can't remember its name...
ReplyDeleteTrès beau travail de documentation. Merci pour les infos.
ReplyDeleteAmicalement.
Roger