The film When Land Becomes Earth looks at Earth; as a self-regulating planet; earth as material both multiple and singular; from its granular form to mountains terraformed by extractive technologies. It encounters scientists, farmers and activists working like soil, using nature-based solutions, resisting in determined, communal and beautiful ways, moving towards matters of reparation.
The camera drifts dreamily through imagery drawn from landscapes transformed by beavers as nature restorers, industrial wastelands polluted with heavy metals, a community compost project processing food waste, mob-grazing cattle rebuilding the soil health of exhausted farmland, moorland drained after generations of peat-cutting.
It shifts from huge expanses of land towards the intimacy of dirt and earth - life held in human hands or the vitality of micro-bacteria invisibly remediating soil polluted with heavy metals. A group of wandering children are tender in their care for each other, seeking shelter, working together for Earthly survival, living well in the ruins.
With kind permission of Meredith Monk, we’ve worked with her soul-calling voice to remind us that this could be our Last Song, to embody life’s elemental capacity for repair and care.
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