. “When fjord and water lie at rest, a tranquil realm reflected, deep within our hearts and souls, the world we love projected”. Directed by Margreth Olin and executive produced by Wim Wenders and Liv Ullman, Songs of The Earth receives its North American Premiere in the TIFF Docs section of the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival.
Receiving recognition with her awarded documentary Raw Youth in 2005 – a movie following the students of a school in Norway a few months before the exam and the lies told not only about human beings but mostly about youth – Olin then became world renowned in 2010, when her debut feature The Angel became the Norwegian contribution to Oscar. The film dwelled on the protagonist Lea, a substance abuser who came from a disturbing past, proving the Norwegian director’s interest in analysing social issues in her films, as she does in her recent documentary Self Portrait (2020). The film was a portrait of Lene Marie Fossen, a visual artist who died of anorexia in 2019.
With her last work presented in Toronto, Margreth Olin seems to be choosing a more spiritual path, so to say. One that still focuses on the characters protagonists – in this case, her parents – but placed in a wider environment. Songs of The Earth is in fact an ode to our planet, but more than this, it’s an ode to the cycle of life and death, to the beauty hidden behind it, and to the acceptance that is the only solution. Olin gets gradually more spiritual, and certainly more personal.
The Oldedalen valley, where her parents live, seems to be the real protagonist of this breathtaking documentary. The footage – combined with amazing songs, some of which are traditional Norwegian which seem to be coming from a childhood memory and cradle the audience like a (sometimes frightening) lullaby– builds up an environment in which her mother and father seem to be almost confused with, like they were its natural creature. In a bond that is explored in a deep, sensational and sensitive way.
It’s also a film about love, about the tradition but mostly about the emotional inheritance that we receive from our parents. It’s a film about the inevitable, about the cycle of living, where generations follow one another, and there is no need to mourn as this is part of the deal that one must accept- willingly or not – when they’re brought to life.
The film’s structure in a way repeats this cycle, as it is divided into chapters which follow the 4 seasons, starting with winter and slowly delving in the warmth.
Through a very interesting editing work, the camera adjoins the flesh of the earth with that of its creatures. There is no difference between the creaks of a glacier and the wrinkle in the skin of an old man anymore, as they both are a product of the same environment and they both pulse with life, although in different ways.
As the title claims, the sound is perhaps the main protagonist of the film, even more than the stunning images. The whizzing of bugs, the water running slowly in the creek or fast amongst the ice, the wind shaking the old spruce, footsteps on different surfaces and so forth, mingle with the voices of the two spouses as they sing or dwell on the memories from the past, and – still in love – talk about the future they still have together. And in the meantime, one season follows the other, casting the audience into a kaleidoscope of beauties, where the same landscapes take on different features, different vibrations, but never cease to communicate with those who behold them. A sublime that is celebrated even when it’s tragically painful, even when earth is fierce, like in the landslide in Lodalen in 1905 that here is remembered, when entire families were swept away in one night. Loss part of the bubble we live in, and the sound of grieving and of the name of the deaths that echoes in the valley is just as natural as the one of bird chirping, or horses neighing. And the bloody tooth of a dead animal covered by snow is the object of the aesthetic gaze of the camera just as the juicy and vital berry that an elderly hand catches in the immediately following shot.
That is why Songs of The Earth is a celebration of living, which is a constant flourishing and perishing, in a perpetual cycle that is both ephemeral, and therefore even more precious.
Margreth Olin’s last work is a breathtaking opera that must absolutely be watched on the big screen, and with an open heart.
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