52docs / 28 - The melting

Honestly I didn’t love the filmmaking in last week’s film.

Watching Stephen Colbert choke up as he tried to read a poem didn’t open my heart, it made the scene about him rather than the poem and I found myself admiring his strangely shaped ear or Helena Bonham Carter’s poorly applied makeup, which probably wasn’t the filmmaker’s intention.

Nature shots and archive material are a poor substitute for the human imagination - that’s where poetry comes alive, in the being of the listener. If we are too busy using our eyes we can’t listen. Which is kind of an issue when it comes to an audio visual medium like film.

Thus the challenge with these big biographical docs about artists. They tend to follow a formula: archive footage/photos of writer/artist reading/working + a historical interview + library footage of visually connected material + various people pontificating on their importance.

It all ends up providing context and being somewhat intellectually interesting - I had no idea John Waters and Mary Oliver had such a close relationship or that she toiled in obscurity for 27 years - but emotionally empty.

Moonage Daydream was a more generative proposition, as was The Nikki Giovanni Project. The Ursula K. Le Guin doc followed the formula but still opened her work and life up for me, as did the Kurt Vonnegut film.

In summary, I’d take Mary’s On Being interview over this film any day, but I’d love to know if you disagree 🙂 

Turning back to the present, if Mary Oliver was saved by the beauty of the world, what can we do to save that beauty?

In Nepal and Tibet glaciers are melting and sweeping whole towns away. Is the natural world that so impacted the poet is becoming more Herzogian as our climate shifts? Can this week’s film bring us closer to the glaciers and their pain?

Director Sara Dosa made the volcanically epic Fire of Love so I’m hoping her follow up is equally powerful.

Review

Trailer

Watch here or via Hulu / Disney+