Yesterday Slashfilm posted a link to the trailer for an upcoming experimental documentary titled General Orders No. 9, along with a poster for the film featuring a semi-silhouetted pipe-smoking rabbit. Even more intriguing was the post’s subheading, which read: “A documentary aimed squarely at Terrence Malick Fans?”

Because I don’t live in New York City or Los Angeles, the only two cities currently enjoying the release of Malick’s newest film The Tree of Life, and because I have a twenty dollar library fine preventing me from renting Badlands or Days of Heaven, I read the post quite with more than mild interest.

Described on its website as an “experimental documentary that contemplates the signs of loss and change in the American South as potent metaphors of personal and collective destiny,” General Orders No. 9 is the debut project of writer/director/producer Robert Persons, a native of Georgia. The trailer is pretty gorgeous (I’ve included a Youtube embed at the end of the post, and a link to Apple’s HD version here) and the Malick comparison wholly justified – cine site Hammer to Nail even declares that it “makes Malick look like a straight shot of Hollywood.” Egads!

While I’m not sure I quite believe a statement like that last one, the trailer certainly piques my interest. It’s full of bucolic scenery, urban sprawl and Malick-y narration (“deer trail, becomes Indian trail, becomes county road”). Also, it’s named after General Lee’s Farewell Address (General Order no. 9) which makes the whole thing even more mysterious.

Unfortunately for those of us living in the nation’s backwaters (Philadelphia, San Francisco, Chicago, Draper, etc.) the film’s only currently scheduled showing is at Brooklyn’s Rerun Gastropub Theater June 24 – 30.

 


 
 
Become a Patron!

This post may contain affiliate links.