Bath Film Festival Day 7

"Sweetgrass"

Ever wondered what really should have gone on up in those mountains between two cowboy sheep herders? I don’t think many people did after they finished watching it. Without Ang Lee’s skills, or any skills whatsoever save those of the film crew and the herders, after watching this monumental film about sheep driving, you’ll be thinking "Ang Lee who?"

“Sweetgrass” (2009) is a beautiful documentary about the last remaining American cowboys. The group of shepherds make the long and very arduous 150-mile journey across the Beartooth mountains of Montana to bring a herd of sheep to summer pastures. It is both a beautiful and ugly experience. They are the last of a unique group of men who risk a whole lot to embark on such an epic journey, but perhaps you’ll think it’s worth it after seeing the landscape they trek through.

Some of the challenges they come across include grizzly bears, wolves, treacherous narrow ledges and harsh weather. You can see from the intimate filming of the cowboys that it takes every bit of themselves to keep going and push forward.

The footage was shot by Lucien Castaing-Taylor, who strapped a camera to the front of his body. Over the course of two summers between 2001 and 2003, he filmed more than 300 hours of footage which was edited down to 105 minutes. The herd of sheep feature almost as much as the landscape, and you can see them swarming down hillsides and precariously stumbling in a long white line across a high ridge. As they, too, struggle to survive, the ordeal is as grueling for them as it is for the cowboys.

Castaing-Taylor and producer Ilisa Barbash’s success in capturing the harsh realities and beautiful rewards of this dying ritual is definitely well worth the watch. If the idea of watching two blokes herding sheep across a mountain doesn’t appeal to you, then see it purely to appreciate the last of the longstanding tradition of the American cowboy.