A FALLOW YEAR
Short Documentary • 18 mins.
A Fallow Year documents a pivotal moment for The Farm School in Athol, Massachusetts — founded in 1989 around connecting people to land. When COVID shuttered their programming and the country's racial reckoning demanded reflection, they did something radical: they stopped. What emerged was a fundamental reorientation — giving produce to underserved communities, and initiating a relationship with the Nipmuc people, on whose ancestral land the school sits, toward the possible return of that land to their stewardship.
Client:
The Farm School
Deliverables:
Festival-Ready Film
DIRECTOR’S Notes:
I know this land. My connection to the Farm School runs deep and personal, which is why I understood immediately that this story couldn't be told in conventional documentary terms. What the moment called for was something lyrical — a film that made space for silence, for transformation, for the weight of what was being released and what was being reclaimed. We invited musician Suz Slezak into the process as a true collaborator, composing and recording the soundtrack live alongside our filming. What she captured — tones drawn from barns and wooden structures, cabbage fields and open wind — became as much the film's voice as anything spoken on camera.
Credits:
Director:
Cinematographer:
Sound Mixer:
Editor:
Composer:
Post-Sound:
Dina Rudick
Dylan Trivette
Adam Johnson
Dina Rudick
Suz Slezak
Sound Lab Studios