“Don’t we have anything more important to do than thinning out plums?” asks Daan.
Daan (left) is a gardener, who may also be the owner—we’re not told—of a 3.5-acre walled garden dating to the 1630s.
The documentary film takes place over a year at a commercial organic estate, where produce is bottled and preserved. There is a ritual to every stage of production, in which many varieties of soft fruit each require a slightly different technique of training and pruning.
Though the stars of this 98-minute show are the master and master pruner, a head gardener and team of helpers come and go.
Jan and Daan have been working on the arbor for 15 years, with the aim of creating a tunnel of pears.
As pear blossom appears, the 86-year-old approaches Daan suggesting that he might not attend, as the fruit is the main thing, “not chit-chat, as it were.” Will Daan get to have his dinner party, and will Jan change his mind?
The garden is laid out along strictly utilitarian lines, with decoration a by-product. Because of the extreme neatness of the beds and the incredible friability of the soil, bare mounds of earth are truly beautiful.
May we suggest buying instead of renting the film?
While Jan gives every plum his full attention, Daan is occasionally seen fiddling with his iPad or walking with intent toward a wall of fruit cordons, only to walk away again with a phone pressed to his head.
“Just as ‘we are what we eat’,” muses Daan, “a tree is as good as the soil it grows in.”
With wonderfully spare captions (“the dandelion,” “the sour cherry”) and a stirring score, for which a lutenist among others is credited, this subtle movie is a gem.
Portrait of a Garden, directed by Rosie Stapel, is showing on the festival circuit and is available via iTunes.