The Biggest Little Farm

The joy of watching The Biggest Little Farm is the Chesters’ eight-year journey of uncompromising success and the faith that the Earth had a grander scheme in the art and science of farming that the rest of the world forgot.

“…banked everything on the simple belief of how the world and nature work together around them…”

You have to admire a film that takes a gamble. Quite frankly, the Chesters by faith just started filming on a dream. Over eight years, there was no guarantee of success, and I’m sure the Vegas-odds leaned toward failure. But to say The Biggest Little Farm is an inspiration is a major understatement. The Chester’s basically took a major mid-life crisis in their life and banked everything on the simple belief of how the world and nature work together around them. The real inspiration comes in the fact that in only one instance did they compromise their convictions on running the farm.

Firmly ensconced in my own mid-life crisis writing film reviews all day, I couldn’t help but feel jealous with the Chesters. As the film started, I kept thinking, “I could do that.” Soon, my thinking changed to “there’s no way, I could ever do that.” These people are warriors.

As a film, The Biggest Little Farm not only has by-the-minute drama and an ever-present tension between success and failure, but as an accomplished cinematographer, the film’s images of the farm is breathtaking. Whether they won or lost the fight, this is a beautiful film to watch with a fantastic score behind it.

While the world debates over Global Warming/Ice Ages/Climate Change, the Chesters show on a relatively small plot of land, how plants, animals, and people work together and gives hope that small changes can make a huge impact on the environment. It’s impossible to walk away from The Biggest Little Farm and not think we, as the shepherds of the Earth, could be doing this a whole lot better.

The Biggest Little Farm screened at the 2018 AFI Fest.