Nishan Chakrabartty
Robin Wright is an acting powerhouse whose turn as Claire Underwood in ‘House of Cards‘ earned her a Golden Globe award. ‘Land’ marks her directorial debut, in which she juggles the duty of the protagonist as well. The film is a poignant take on the journey of Edee Mathis, who resorts to Wyoming’s vast wilderness to find solace amidst an unbearable loss.
She cuts herself off from the outside world to recuperate in nature’s lap, all the while trying to figure out a way to survive in the harsh climate. Miguel (Demian Bichir), a local hunter, comes to her aid and provides support in the face of tough situations. The snowy landscapes invited us to look into the locations that are integral to the narrative of ‘Land.’ If you want to know where this movie was filmed, you are at the right place!
Land Filming Locations
The filming of ‘Land’ commenced in October 2019 in Canada. The vast expanses of the Calgary wilderness served as the perfect backdrop for Edee’s journey into self-isolation. Here are further details.
Calgary, Alberta
To find the perfect place for filming, producers had scouted for locations across Utah and British Columbia. Eventually, they resorted to Alberta for its brazen and harsh wilderness, which contained a powerful expression required for the film’s narrative. Apart from Calgary, the production also continued in the nearby areas of Didsbury and Kananaskis in Alberta, across a two-month time period. Most of the crew members were hired locally for their knowledge of the terrain, which was a crucial aspect of the filming process.
A substantial part of the film was shot atop Moose Mountain in Kananaskis amidst the turbulent weather. The production was halted three times due to massive mounds of snow and windspeed to the tune of a hundred kilometers per hour. Shooting across Alberta’s remote lands, the crew had constructed a log cabin at an altitude of 2400 meters. They had to film 10 to 15 scenes a day because of the wintry conditions.
Bears were a common sighting on the sets, and the crew had to be cautious while filming the scenes. Moreover, the double duties of directing and acting in the inhospitable weather were a challenge for Robin Wright. She had to be careful even while walking on the snow to watch the playbacks, as her footprints were visible on the camera while shooting subsequent scenes. Wright also learned how to split logs and skin animals from a local mountain dweller in preparation for her role.
Cinematographer Bobby Bukowski’s brilliant lensing captured the intense weather of the Alberta landscape. The slow unfurling of Edee’s relation with the expanses of pristine snow is accentuated by Bukowski’s deft handling of the subject matter. Moreover, production designer Trevor Smith’s meticulously constructed interiors of Edee’s Chicago apartment juxtaposes efficiently with the Wyoming wilderness.
It depicts the privileges of city-life versus the struggles of surviving nature’s brutality. The filming process of ‘Land’ was a spiritual recourse into the healing effects of nature, as exemplified by Demian Bichir when he remarked, “When we wrapped, I just stood up and went for a hug. It was such a beautiful feeling to hug a tree. I don’t remember ever having done something like that, so many things have changed.”
Read More: Is Land Based on a True Story?
