Terra Firma

Filmmakers Christine Anthony and Owen Masterson's Terra Firma profiles three American female veterans who—following deployments in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kuwait—found healing at home through farming. Anna and her husband run a small operation in North Carolina; Sonia heads a non-profit that grows vegetables for food banks in her Iowa hometown; and Althea is working her ancestors' land in Georgia. The subjects speak at length about their lives in the armed forces, the jobs they held, their responsibilities, and the comradeship of military life—as well as its stultifying bureaucracy and physical strain. All three returned home with post-traumatic stress disorder, but far from the turmoil of violent conflict, the rural lifestyle offers welcome relief. Anna, who sells homemade jams and humanely raised pork at a farmers' market, explains why agriculture is a good occupation for vets: being an often solitary and quiet undertaking, it allowed her to develop confidence as she successfully cared for animals and created high-quality products. Sonia found that focusing on feeding the locals served as a positive, nondestructive extension of her military service; while Althea rebuilt the acreage her family has owned for six generations, connecting her future with a longstanding past. The subjects here speak in honest, articulate voices in extensive interviews that are punctuated with footage from their farms and still photos from military deployments. Recommended. Aud: H, C, P. (M. Puffer-Rothenberg)