You're setting yourself up for irony when you call your soda company Americana. I'd secured one of their delicious cherry colas on my way into the Grand Illusion's lone screening room to watch Northern Lights for the first time in many years. I first encountered it when I looked up the Camera d'Or award (Best First-Time Director) list for Cannes, and it was the first film to get it. Its two writer-directors, John Hanson and Rob Nilsson, were born'n'bred Midwesterners, and seeing as their film concerned Midwestern history, and my extended family hails from Minnesota and South Dakota, it was natural that I should see it. My chances were limited, as the lone VHS release from the 80's was extremely out of print and very expensive, and Scarecrow's copy required a sizable deposit to rent it. But, rent I did, and was enchanted by its crisp B&W bleakness and well-told story of a fascinating pocket of American history I had never heard of before. I'm many years older now, and having seen the film again I can say that it's better than I remember it and worth checking out at one of the screenings this next week. I guarantee you've never heard so much political history about North Dakota in your life.
The film begins with a very old man in 1978, a former homesteader who was living in the city in his old age. He was going through his things when he found the diary of Ray Sorensen, a North Dakota wheat farmer of his same generation, and decides to type up Ray's story. We then move into that story: 1915 in the empty plains of North Dakota. Ray is vying to marry Inga Olsness, both of whom belong to wheat farming Norwegian families. Ray's friends bug him about joining the Nonpartisan League, a new "farmers' rights" political movement attempting to gain members after several other semi-Socialist groups had failed before it - Ray is naturally skeptical, considering those failures, though not as much as his friend John. He's got a lot of work to do to keep the farm running, and ends up delaying the wedding until the Winter harvest is finished. Unfortunately, things start going downhill fast. One night, Ray's father goes for a walk, sits against a scarecrow to drink, and dies of exposure. The time for mourning is brief, as the threshing machines are due to arrive in a couple of days, and when they do arrive a terrible blizzard hits. Their work seems almost impossible, as the grinding howl of the threshers mixes with the howl of the blizzard, but they manage to save 90% of the crops. The price of wheat is down, and John insists on waiting to sell it until the price goes up, but their funds soon run down. Much worse is that the bank forecloses on the Olsness's farm, forcing Inga to move to the city with her family, and the passing of Ray's wedding day is rock bottom. In his desperation he gets more involved in the Nonpartisan League, and through gathering farmers to the cause and the ticking clock of survival Ray and his fellow farmers find a newfound hope and power, a glimmer of reward for their trials in the Heart of the Void.
In case you haven't noticed, Northern Lights ain't exactly an upper. Shot entirely in B&W in the Dakota Nothing, Ray's world is oppressively bleak, all big skies and dry weeds. Keen picturewatchers will recall that Days of Heaven came out the same year as Northern Lights, and while it was also a portrait of wheat farming in the 1910's the tribulations of the Lights families makes Sam Shephard's farm look like a trip to Starbucks. At least they didn't have to deal with any blizzards, and Shephard was raking in the cash. The conditions in Lights are so extreme and unfair it's a miracle anybody survived at all, and the film's nitty-gritty focus on farming life eclipses Malick's film in terms of survivalist terror. Also, I should warn you that there is a rather graphic sequence where the men kill and butcher their last pig, and while I can't be sure it looks like they really did kill that pig on film. Perhaps I'm a hypocrite for recommending a movie that might contain real animal murder while maintaining a personal boycott against Lars von Trier for killing a donkey for Manderlay, but there's a chance that it was faked and Hanson & Nilsson aren't nearly as scumbaggy as Trier.
Despite all this, Northern Lights is strikingly beautiful, both visually and aurally. The camera placement is superb, continually finding unique angles to capture the prairie and its inhabitants. The camera is occasionally pointed into the setting sun, and the B&W film stock makes the sun-adorned horizon a visual wonder. Some of the most haunting moments are brought about when characters have to walk from one house to another in the dead of night, the only light an oil lamp and the only sound the eternal winds. One particularly arresting shot is at the funeral of Ray's father - they buried him in an open field, and as they leave the camera crams the horizon to the bottom of the frame, leaving the viewer with a tiny cross against a huge overcast sky, the clouds whorling like spilled car oil. The music is a lovely-yet-quirky mixture of bagpipe tunes, harp and 70's electric piano, sometimes primeval folk music and other times like Captain Beefheart's "A Carrot is as Close as a Rabbit Gets to a Diamond". The actors playing Ray, Inga and John are all excellent, and the directors give them plenty of character moments to show off their naturalist chops. The other actors are all non-professional native North Dakotans, and their natural, mumbly delivery ensures an authentic docudrama feel for the movie. If Northern Lights achieves anything it fully immerses the viewer in the rural 1910's, and at a couple of important moments the directors capture the scene through series of still shots reminiscent of turn-of-the-century photography, their moments joyous and life-affirming. Above all it's a well-told story, and the first time in my life in which I saw the emotional power of the ideals of Socialism.
I grew up after the fall of the USSR, and the combination of the failure of the Soviet Union and the face-slapping insanity of North Korea have painted a picture of irreversible corruption and stupidity for large-scale Socialism. Americans will never fully embrace Socialism because of this, and while some other Western countries have implemented Socialist policies in certain institutions they are rightfully wary of the Full Marx. Northern Lights depicts a life-or-death situation in which practical, small-scale Socialism is not only possible but essential, as farmers were put in a stranglehold by a handful of large companies in Minneapolis scooping profits off a long line of mounting costs. The Nonpartisan League sought to give control of sales, distribution and production to farmers, and their struggle wasn't about ideals but rather practical survival. The storytelling in the film is so assured that the viewer is swept up in the emotional journey of the farmers, so much so that their meager political victories are cathartic moments of release and rebirth.
Northern Lights is often cited as a touchstone in the American independent renaissance that gained traction in the 80's, though it virtually disappeared from circulation after it's Camera d'Or win. It was released in the 80's by New World Video, a company mostly known for B-grade genre flicks, and while that may have contributed to its poor sales I blame the fact that downbeat period political dramas aren't exactly a hotcake market. Very recently, the film was restored by Artists Public Domain, a company that specializes in digging up and restoring lost great films, and the print I saw was the restored 35mm print they created. It looks really nice, with a lot of depth and sharpness (as well as some charming dirt here and there), and I'm eternally grateful for their work. Hopefully a DVD will come out, but as the company doesn't put out DVD's we'll just have to wait and see if another company can take the opportunity *COUGH* Criterion *COUGH*.
The irony in drinking a soda called Americana laid in the realization that, in order for the delicious cherry cola to get into my hand, there were so many layers of payment in between sugar production, soda production, packaging, distribution and finally its sale at the Grand Illusion, each with their own profit boosting, that my $2.00 soda's raw parts probably cost all of 17 cents to make. With sufficient means and time I could have made a cherry cola at my house and smuggled it in my jacket pocket, and a Socialist community might have produced a variety of sodas by the hard work of the whole family. That doesn't mean anybody is willing to do that, and I prefer to leave sodamaking to the professionals. I got an Orange Cream for the road, and as I walked back to my car in the pouring rain, Americana orange soda in my jacket pocket, I thanked whatever lord may have been listening that I wasn't harvesting wheat in a blizzard in the middle of North Dakota.
~PNK
The film begins with a very old man in 1978, a former homesteader who was living in the city in his old age. He was going through his things when he found the diary of Ray Sorensen, a North Dakota wheat farmer of his same generation, and decides to type up Ray's story. We then move into that story: 1915 in the empty plains of North Dakota. Ray is vying to marry Inga Olsness, both of whom belong to wheat farming Norwegian families. Ray's friends bug him about joining the Nonpartisan League, a new "farmers' rights" political movement attempting to gain members after several other semi-Socialist groups had failed before it - Ray is naturally skeptical, considering those failures, though not as much as his friend John. He's got a lot of work to do to keep the farm running, and ends up delaying the wedding until the Winter harvest is finished. Unfortunately, things start going downhill fast. One night, Ray's father goes for a walk, sits against a scarecrow to drink, and dies of exposure. The time for mourning is brief, as the threshing machines are due to arrive in a couple of days, and when they do arrive a terrible blizzard hits. Their work seems almost impossible, as the grinding howl of the threshers mixes with the howl of the blizzard, but they manage to save 90% of the crops. The price of wheat is down, and John insists on waiting to sell it until the price goes up, but their funds soon run down. Much worse is that the bank forecloses on the Olsness's farm, forcing Inga to move to the city with her family, and the passing of Ray's wedding day is rock bottom. In his desperation he gets more involved in the Nonpartisan League, and through gathering farmers to the cause and the ticking clock of survival Ray and his fellow farmers find a newfound hope and power, a glimmer of reward for their trials in the Heart of the Void.
In case you haven't noticed, Northern Lights ain't exactly an upper. Shot entirely in B&W in the Dakota Nothing, Ray's world is oppressively bleak, all big skies and dry weeds. Keen picturewatchers will recall that Days of Heaven came out the same year as Northern Lights, and while it was also a portrait of wheat farming in the 1910's the tribulations of the Lights families makes Sam Shephard's farm look like a trip to Starbucks. At least they didn't have to deal with any blizzards, and Shephard was raking in the cash. The conditions in Lights are so extreme and unfair it's a miracle anybody survived at all, and the film's nitty-gritty focus on farming life eclipses Malick's film in terms of survivalist terror. Also, I should warn you that there is a rather graphic sequence where the men kill and butcher their last pig, and while I can't be sure it looks like they really did kill that pig on film. Perhaps I'm a hypocrite for recommending a movie that might contain real animal murder while maintaining a personal boycott against Lars von Trier for killing a donkey for Manderlay, but there's a chance that it was faked and Hanson & Nilsson aren't nearly as scumbaggy as Trier.
Despite all this, Northern Lights is strikingly beautiful, both visually and aurally. The camera placement is superb, continually finding unique angles to capture the prairie and its inhabitants. The camera is occasionally pointed into the setting sun, and the B&W film stock makes the sun-adorned horizon a visual wonder. Some of the most haunting moments are brought about when characters have to walk from one house to another in the dead of night, the only light an oil lamp and the only sound the eternal winds. One particularly arresting shot is at the funeral of Ray's father - they buried him in an open field, and as they leave the camera crams the horizon to the bottom of the frame, leaving the viewer with a tiny cross against a huge overcast sky, the clouds whorling like spilled car oil. The music is a lovely-yet-quirky mixture of bagpipe tunes, harp and 70's electric piano, sometimes primeval folk music and other times like Captain Beefheart's "A Carrot is as Close as a Rabbit Gets to a Diamond". The actors playing Ray, Inga and John are all excellent, and the directors give them plenty of character moments to show off their naturalist chops. The other actors are all non-professional native North Dakotans, and their natural, mumbly delivery ensures an authentic docudrama feel for the movie. If Northern Lights achieves anything it fully immerses the viewer in the rural 1910's, and at a couple of important moments the directors capture the scene through series of still shots reminiscent of turn-of-the-century photography, their moments joyous and life-affirming. Above all it's a well-told story, and the first time in my life in which I saw the emotional power of the ideals of Socialism.
I grew up after the fall of the USSR, and the combination of the failure of the Soviet Union and the face-slapping insanity of North Korea have painted a picture of irreversible corruption and stupidity for large-scale Socialism. Americans will never fully embrace Socialism because of this, and while some other Western countries have implemented Socialist policies in certain institutions they are rightfully wary of the Full Marx. Northern Lights depicts a life-or-death situation in which practical, small-scale Socialism is not only possible but essential, as farmers were put in a stranglehold by a handful of large companies in Minneapolis scooping profits off a long line of mounting costs. The Nonpartisan League sought to give control of sales, distribution and production to farmers, and their struggle wasn't about ideals but rather practical survival. The storytelling in the film is so assured that the viewer is swept up in the emotional journey of the farmers, so much so that their meager political victories are cathartic moments of release and rebirth.
Northern Lights is often cited as a touchstone in the American independent renaissance that gained traction in the 80's, though it virtually disappeared from circulation after it's Camera d'Or win. It was released in the 80's by New World Video, a company mostly known for B-grade genre flicks, and while that may have contributed to its poor sales I blame the fact that downbeat period political dramas aren't exactly a hotcake market. Very recently, the film was restored by Artists Public Domain, a company that specializes in digging up and restoring lost great films, and the print I saw was the restored 35mm print they created. It looks really nice, with a lot of depth and sharpness (as well as some charming dirt here and there), and I'm eternally grateful for their work. Hopefully a DVD will come out, but as the company doesn't put out DVD's we'll just have to wait and see if another company can take the opportunity *COUGH* Criterion *COUGH*.
The irony in drinking a soda called Americana laid in the realization that, in order for the delicious cherry cola to get into my hand, there were so many layers of payment in between sugar production, soda production, packaging, distribution and finally its sale at the Grand Illusion, each with their own profit boosting, that my $2.00 soda's raw parts probably cost all of 17 cents to make. With sufficient means and time I could have made a cherry cola at my house and smuggled it in my jacket pocket, and a Socialist community might have produced a variety of sodas by the hard work of the whole family. That doesn't mean anybody is willing to do that, and I prefer to leave sodamaking to the professionals. I got an Orange Cream for the road, and as I walked back to my car in the pouring rain, Americana orange soda in my jacket pocket, I thanked whatever lord may have been listening that I wasn't harvesting wheat in a blizzard in the middle of North Dakota.
~PNK
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