THE BIGGEST LITTLE FARM

If you grew up reading stories about small family farms with ducks and pigs and lambs and loyal 

sheepdogs, the documentary "The Biggest Little Farm" will probably make you happy, and for th

e same reason I choose this documentary as my project.The main characters (one of whom is 

also the filmmaker) left urban life and started farming because they had spent their entire lives 

carrying around these kinds of nostalgic memories in their heads.Farming truth proves to be 

much less rosy, of course — a fact telegraphed in the film's ominous flashforward opening that 

heralds a biblically based natural disaster that farmers will somehow have to survive.

John is a director-cinematographer specializing in wildlife photography, and Molly is a chef 

and food blogger deeply involved in rediscovering traditional farming techniques as opposed to 

large-scale, pesticide-intensive agriculture, which is highly profitable but ravishes the land.

With advice and guidance from the biodynamic farming guru Alan York, they bring back to life 

a large plot with mostly avocado and lemon trees on a dusty sod of exhausted soil, cultivating a 

wide variety of fruit and herds of chickens and ducks whose eggs go down a storm with foodies.

Over the almost ten years covered in the film, they've grown into sheep, cows, and an endearing 

sow that's becoming the best buddies with a greasy looking rooster, all of which John films with

great skill and empathy. But it's to the credit of the film that it doesn't just become a self-

congratulatory, highly professional home movie; Chester is responsible for exploring the

downside and many challenges inherent in their agrarian methods.

The couple must decide whether to go to

war with the coyotes when their flocks are decimated; meanwhile, their pro diversity approach 

properly stimulates the population of birds and mammals, but that also means damaged fruit 

crops. Then there is the growing threat of wildfires.

Although it begins with a raging California wildfire (and later worries about the worst drought th

at the state has seen in 1,200 years), "Farm" never discusses global warming or pollution

Instead, it's unfathomably solutions oriented, like the Chesters themselves, focusing on

what a small group of dedicated people can do to improve their immediate environment. Answer:

more than anyone could have thought about it. And compared to the sky-falling tone of most

eco-docs, that upbeat, motivational approach makes the biggest difference.

Some might wonder how exactly, they managed to raise enough to move out of an apartment in

Santa Monica and then suddenly buy what looks like a substantial piece of real estate. Not many

of us can afford to just pick up and move in a short time to give a better home to a dog, much

less to a 240 + acre farm that has been developed as a self-contained ecosystem experiment.

Livestock, fertilizer, labor and machinery are all costly, and apart from a brief reference to "some

investors who saw this old way of farming as the future," there is no information on how they

made all this happen, only that they just did

But once the Chesters get settled in and realize how many moving parts there are on even a small

farm, the film begins to feel more grounded and consistent. Farmers are repeatedly called upon

to find solutions to urgent, everyday problems, such as how to prevent snails from swamping

their lemon trees, how to prevent coyotes from killing their ducks without having to kill coyotes,

and how to get an orphaned lamb to maturity without having to put it down prematurely. "The

Biggest Little Farm" is the most fascinating account of people who made a dream come true,

then discovered that keeping it alive is hard, sometimes heartbreaking work.