Terrence Malick has an undeniable surrealism to his craft. He takes advantage of the terrestrial world and evolves it alongside his characters. His shift in the four seasons is a shift in the four temperaments. Malick’s Days of Heaven manages to maintain a calming beauty even through the plagues and hardships of the World War I era. With this calmness though, seeds an everlasting loneliness and within this beauty stems a broken and unfaithful courtship. Nobody is perfect in his world; each individual has a “half-angel and half-devil” persona to them. Whether it be a short-fused farmer or a couple of con artist-romantics, they are all part of one big melting pot; they all have their dark side, so who is to judge? A predestined catastrophe awaits…show more content… In the booming turmoil of this mill emerges a verbal argument and Bill taking out his supervisor with a shovel. He flees by train with Abby and Linda out of Chicago. They find themselves harvesting wheat fields for a wealthy farmer (Sam Shepard) who falls for Abby at first glance. Bill and Abby conceal their love for each other under the alias of brother and sister. Bill takes advantage of the newfound information that the farmer is falling ill and will most likely be dead within a year. He convinces Abby to marry the farmer in order to take over his estate as their own once he has passed. The plan falls short when the farmer seems to have no alteration in state of health. The seasons change and the farmer becomes skeptical of Bill and Abby’s fondness of one another. Abby and him get in an odd confrontation which leads to Bills departure for a while. Linda, Abby, and the farmer live happily with one another and all the suspicion blows over. That is until Bill returns and the paranoia resurfaces resulting in an apocalyptic scenario straight out of the Book of…show more content… They almost seem guided by nature and seasonal change; especially given that their source of work is guided by the change in season. The film is not necessarily driven by characters emotions but rather the atmosphere and scenery of the film. When there were ups and downs, they were reinforced by the seasonal changes and harvesting cycles or the plagues of a harvest. However, this would be nothing more than a cleverly shot film of painted rolling hills of wheat and an intriguing melodrama if it weren’t for Linda Manz voice over that philosophically depicts this drama from the standpoint of a child. The story does not bombard us with emotions but rather displays them from a distance through arbitrary commentary that somehow just works. She gives us insight into her thoughts every now and then giving us very naïve commentary such as suggesting she could be a mud doctor and “check out the earth underneath.” While at the same time, she gives very important information such as the farmer’s unchanging health status. The interchanging narration brings the story to life. She’s not given some inhuman knowledge that someone her age would otherwise not possess; rather, she is given thoughts one would expect from someone her age and it is so real that it is eerie. She is almost indirectly the focus of the film. The drama and love-triangle represented is all surrounding her and the audience is
