Since «George Washington» (2000) opens with a teenage girl's dreamy, wise - beyond - her - years narration as the camera floats in slow - motion through waving
fields of grass and glides along railroad tracks, you probably don't need to be told that first - time feature director David Gordon Green, then just twenty five and fresh out
of film school, was a
big Terrence Malick fan.
Sometimes this was easy, all you had to do was step onto it, the train was plush and comfortable and full
of people smiling at you in a hush, and a conductor who punched your ticket and tousled your head with his
big hand, saying, Ain't you pretty, ain't you the prettiest girl now, lucky lady taking a
big train trip with your daddy, while you sank into the dreamy softness
of your seat and sipped ginger ale from a can and watched the world float in magical silence past your window, the tall buildings
of the city in the crisp autumn light and then the backs
of the houses with laundry flapping and a crossing with gates where a boy was waving from his bicycle, and then the woods and
fields and a single cow eating
grass.......
For years before we moved out to the country or had contacts that have perfectly groomed training ponds, we trained on soccer
fields, undeveloped commercial lots and church lands that were
big flat areas
of grass.
Cows ate
grass in their home out on the range»Til the land got developed into towns Now they're in the feedlot and they're eatin» corn flakes With some hormones to wash»em down And instead
of fertilizin'the
fields where they graze Those
big brown piles are risin» - day after day