The Biggest Little Farm

Since writing and illustrating a children’s book Maui and His Back Legs and creating images for MAXyourMIND and this blog I have a new respect for illustrators who do it for a living.  It’s fun creating pictures but takes a lot of imagination, hard work and time.

Jason Carpenter, Jason-Carpenter.com, is an Emmy award winner for animating “He Named Me Malala” about Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Malala Yousafzai.  He and his wife Rachel are friends of my daughter.   

Running animals, from “The Biggest Little Farm”

Jason did the animation for a new movie “The Biggest Little Farm”,  a documentary about a young couple (and a dog), with no farming experience, just big ideas  who aspire to grow animals and crops in sustainable, healthy ways.  I went to see it because I know Jason, not knowing what to expect.

 I rarely recommend movies but I loved the film and agree with the reviews:

• “Breathtaking…engaging, illuminating…a must-see”– Washington Post
• “A winning doc…. A blueprint for saving the earth.”– LA Times
• “One of the year’s best films…” – San Francisco Chronicle
• “Utterly joyful, inspiring…” – NY Times

The premise is simple:

John & Molly buy 200 acres of arid land outside of Los Angeles.  The film follows their successes and failures as they work to develop a sustainable farm, relying on critters like goats, worms, owls, a pig named Emma and cayotes (among other things) to restore the eco-culture. 

The cinematography was spectacular and images of wild-life and arial photography delightful.  I was particularly impressed to find was suspense, human aspiration and learning from failure in a film about a farm.

I have no doubt you will be inspired, as I was, to see it is possible to align with our earth’s ecosystem and live in harmony with nature rather than destroy it.  So I’m spreading the word.

Take a look at the trailer: