On the Dial | Reclusive New England
I recently returned from a trip to Maine. I had never been before and it seemed like a good place to lay low after the election results. I spent two days in Portland and two days in Mount Desert Island just outside of Acadia National Park. Acadia is fucking magical. Home to the highest peak on the U.S. Eastern Seaboard (Cadillac Mountain), and surrounded by crashing waves and jutting cliffs, I felt swallowed up Acadia's massive beauty. If you've never been, start planning your trip now. In the mean time, check out two fantastic documentaries about reclusive farmers in the same region.
Directed by Tony Stone, Peter and the Farm (Magnolia Pictures 2016) is a film about Peter Dunning and his farm in Vermont. A former artist and product of the 1960 counterculture movement, Peter has since been divorced three times and tends to his farm alone. Equal parts informative, heartbreaking, funny, and cynical this documentary is not one to miss.
Peter and the Farm reminds me a lot of Burt's Buzz (Everyday Pictures 2013)—an intimate documentary directed by Jody Shapiro about the iconic founder of Burt's Bees, Burt Shavitz, who also lived a secluded life in New England. Burt passed away in upstate Maine last year, but the documentary captures his charm and melancholy with stark originality and empathy.
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