Celebrating Women’s Day, try to remember at least a dozen female directors. It’s probably not going to be an easy task for most of us – injustice still happens today. If you want to make a change, then a poignant but rousing feature, First Cow (2019), by Kelly Reichardt might be the right start. Be warned – it might not be everybody’s cup of tea; it does revolve around a cup of milk, after all.
King Lu:What I’m saying is history isn’t here yet. It’s coming, but we got here early this time. Maybe this time around we can be ready for it. We can take it on our own terms.
Reichardt sets the green depth of the forest against the mud and rickety shelters of those scraping by in the Oregon outpost.
Unlike Andrea Arnold’s Cow (2022), a gut-wrenching documentary that I’m too emotional to watch until the bitter end, this one hits you just as hard, but it seems less painful. I must admit, it is not a slow burner that comes to an explosive point. It does not burn; it lingers. It has its pace, the unhurried yet cumbersome daily rhythm of the lives of poor people seeking fortune back in 1820. Immigrants, fur trappers, gold diggers, and one skilled cook.
Otis “Cookie” Figowitz, a quiet chef harassed by fellow trappers, meets King-Lu, a Chinese immigrant accused of killing a Russian man. Lu finds Cookie babysitting an infant during a bar fight and invites him to his house. Well, a house – more a pile of sticks. They both have their dreams. Cookie wants to open a bakery. Maybe a hotel, who knows? Lu thinks about starting a farm. If there’s one thing connecting all those poor souls, that’s hope.
Cookie Figowitz:My momma died when I was born. Then my daddy died. I had to move on to find work. Never stopped moving.
Reichardt contrasts the vast expanse of green nature with crumbling, man-made shacks and muddy outposts.
The outpost is filthy and grimy. Anything goes. People trade bonds, jewels, and gold. You can see some mushrooms on sale at the drab flea market. A scatter of beads here, some clams there. Surrounded by mire, a man could just dream of grandma’s pie on the windowsill. But there’s just water and flour. Or water and mud, and that’s all there is. Cookie and Lu find out that the outpost’s first dairy cow has been brought to the plot of the wealthiest English trader in the county. And she’s unattended at night. With Cookie’s expertise, they start stealing her milk daily to make ‘oily cookies’, which taste great thanks to the milk and honey. And it works as a metaphor, too.
Framing of the characters sometimes separates them, and sometimes brings them together in various ways.
Man:This ain’t a place for cows. God would’ve put cows here if it was. Lloyd: No place for white men either then.
Reichardt frames the film perfectly, giving you the ending from the start. But it felt only hinted at, and I seemed to forget about it until the perfect moment when it all made sense, and you knew why. I salute Reichardt for her framing choice since it works without unnecessary explanations. After all, the driving force of this film is not the plot. Like my favorite The Banshees of Inisherin (2022), it is once again a story about friendship. Cookie and Lu mix their belongings in their ramshackle shed. The poor man cannot start on his own – Lu emphasizes. They need a miracle. Or a crime. Cookie stares at the cow, her coat shining in the sun. She’s a glorious creature. He talks to her. Her children and mate died. Cookie whispers sweetly to the cow while the moon blankets them. She, too, offers an act of kindness.
Reichardt often uses darkness to heighten the invigorating tension and portray the overwhelming gloom of life back then.
Cookie: Some people can’t imagine being stolen from. They’re too strong.
Reichardt tells the story of false senses of pride, of people living in superficial communities full of mutual distrust. But sometimes these isolated acts of kindness provide hope that there’s more to life than this. The film is evocative and naturalistic, similar to other works of hers. The Oregon outpost wasn’t a place for women, even though I’m sure strong female characters could shine as well. I see it as a companion piece to a film from the same year, Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019) by Céline Sciamma, in which female relationships develop in a world seemingly devoid of male presence, whereas First Cow does the opposite.
First Cow, with light shining upon her, transforming her into a godlike creature.
Reichardt is the master of subtle quietness. As the editor of all her films, with a meticulousness that recalls Kurosawa, she created a comfortable yet captivating chain of shots. The dairy cow was depicted in all its glory on a boat in the middle of a river, standing proud like Ozymandias – before his fall. Shots of endless scenery and the green depth of nature are contrasted with mud and dirt surrounding rickety shelters and broken-down cabins.
I was astounded by how dark this film is. Only the moon sheds light on both crime and love. All of the dimness contributes to the film’s deep poignancy. The film begins with someone uncovering old bones, never knowing they belonged to people who were kind. Maybe that’s the most we can ask for. That long after we’re gone, the kindness was real, even if no one remembers it.
