The Practice of the Wild

Real Conversation
These two old friends, both so erudite and so funny, talk in a series of quiet settings indoors and out. It's a wide-ranging conversation that takes surprising turns around the central question of what it is to be human in a more-than-human world. A beautifully done film - I only wish it had been twice as long.

A Beautiful Soul
All lovers of nature, Zen, and Gary Snyder's poetry must see this documentary. It provides insights of Snyder's life and crative work from Dharma Bums to Turtle Island to date. The role of chain-smoking, obese, and inarticulate (yeah, I know, he's written some TREMENDOUS poetry & prose--but he doesn't come off well in this film) Jim Harrison is a sort of vulgar Yin to Snyder's spiritual Yang. Strange but it works.

the wild inside
While Snyder and Harrison aren't usually associated with one another,they are apparently friends for some time.I'm not sure how this film was put together,the outdoor scenes taking place in a location neither lives in, but the casual conversation and the shared values are interesting to witness.It is not directly taken from Snyder's book of the same title,but his is always for me an interesting mind.I wonder if he sees in Harrison a kind of incarnation of some crazy Han Shan Chinese poet;he sort of resembles such a character,rather disheveled and wildeyed.But the exterior(as Snyder teases him at one point) hides a mind besotted with wonder and thought.I enjoyed their company,though it isn't a definitive look at either.Just two men in the world who appreciate the practice of the wild mind,the wilderness within and without us, the "joyful interpenetration' as Snyder once wrote

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