Revival of Independent Film ‘Northern Lights’ Illuminates Farmers’ Struggles and North Dakota’s Nonpartisan League

In 1915, a political party called the Nonpartisan League was founded in North Dakota to combat what its members, mostly farmers, saw as exploitation by corporations and financial institutions. The 1978 film “Northern Lights,” to be revived at Film at Lincoln Center starting Friday, looks at the grassroots beginnings of the party from the perspective of one of its organizers, Ray Sorenson, a character somewhat based on co-director John Hanson’s grandfather and the reminiscences of Henry Martinson, a 94-year-old farmer who appears at the start and end of the film. The word “grassroots” is key here, for it works to describe not only the plot’s examination of community organizing but also the film’s expansive imagery of grassland and farms of the Great Plains landscape. Additionally, the word could be applied to the efforts by Mr. Hanson and his colleague, Rob Nilsson, in getting their independently produced picture to be seen, with local screenings in and around North Dakota leading to its inclusion in the 1979 Cannes Film Festival, where the directors shared the Camera d’Or award for best first feature. Shot in black-and-white and featuring many rural non-actors, the drama explores a stark atmosphere of hardship and struggle that also includes great beauty and tenderness, in keeping with its entwined storylines of harvesting, activism, and young love. Finding the lyrical in leftist politics, Messrs. Hanson and Nilsson borrowed from Italian Neorealist cinema to create a classic portrait of political consciousness that’s both rigorous and humane, focused on humble people facing harsh circumstances in a grand but grim landscape.After the framing device with Mr. Martinson, the film’s first act vividly evokes an early 20th century immigrant homestead, particularly during a dinner scene celebrating Ray’s engagement to local girl Inga. His mother and father are played by Helen and Ray Ness, two non-actors who lived in Crosby, North Dakota, with their ease with the Norwegian language adding to the authenticity. As is typical of many immigrant/first-generation American households, the younger ones speak in English with the occasional foreign pronouncement, while the elders tend to use their native tongues. Generally jovial, the gathering does have its tense moments, as when Ray’s brother John recites a strangely suggestive poem.Still from ’Northern Lights.’ Via Kino LorberShort clips showing the killing of a pig might turn off some viewers, yet like the recurrent images of fields etched with snow and pitch black nights indicate, the filmmakers wish to detail and not just outline the life of farmers. When threshing time arrives, a key sequence depicts the family and its neighbors toiling during a blizzard in order to save the crop. We’re told that grain prices are down, shipping rates are up, and that most farmers hold on to the grain in the hopes that the value of wheat will go up. Consecutive tribulations lead to Ray’s disillusionment and eventual commitment to the cause: his father dies of apparent alcoholism and exposure — the funeral is distinctly haunting — and his wedding to Inga is postponed after her parents lose their home. A noncommittal ally of the Nonpartisan League up to this point, Ray begins to see how its aims could help him and his brother, who are alone on the farm after their mother heads to Ohio, negotiate with a more cooperative bank and rise above subsistence-level living. Two fantastic scenes of canvassing further demonstrate Ray’s political awakening and natural interpersonal skills: one in which he makes an appeal to an old farmer friend while they sit on a pile of rocks and another where he meets with several men — their rugged faces partly hidden by their caps — and the mood is casual and Socratic. Lines such as, “Never met an organizer yet with a sense of humor,” and, “Socialists just don’t like success,” heard in voiceover or in moments with other actors, reflect Ray’s pragmatism and ambivalence toward the party. Yet still he sets out across the northern part of the state in a Model T because he believes that farmers lack dedicated representatives.The love story between Ray and Inga and specific dialogue addressing the lives of wives and women illustrate not only the storytelling acumen of Messrs. Hanson and Nilsson but how they were conscientious of including different perspectives in the film. A late scene in which Inga sees her future life with Ray mirroring her mother’s sad, disquieting marriage astonishes, with actress Susan Lynch impressing with her emotional honesty and delicacy. The other two professional actors — lead Robert Behling as Ray and Joe Spano as John — are fantastic throughout, with each giving subtle, occasionally disarming performances.Intermittently, a cheesy electronic score takes one out of the movie’s evocative period reconstruction, reflecting the 1970s era in which it was made, though for the most part the soundtrack features folk instrumentals and songs. Also somewhat irksome is the onscreen text that appears at intervals to over-explain the political context, though even it can’t spoil the joy and triumph one feels for the characters when the Nonpartisan League candidate for governor (Lynn Frazier) wins the Republican primary in 1916. Soon, the party would rise to power and establish agricultural and financial institutions designed to support farmers and local merchants. When we hear Ray state near the end, “For the first time in our lives, we felt powerful,” one can’t help but feel that this intelligent, striking movie also imparts a sense of possibility and community to its viewers.

Revival of Independent Film ‘Northern Lights’ Illuminates Farmers’ Struggles and North Dakota’s Nonpartisan League

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