To outsiders, the nomad lifestyle consists simply of wandering around with no goal other than some immaterial form of self-discovery. But for Frances McDormand’s Fern in Nomadland it is a meditation in perpetual motion, considering her mortality as she stares down her own inevitable death. She has spent her life earning a living – a statement which is in itself deeply ironic, but also melancholy as she comes to realise that the idea a “living” must be earned is nothing more than a notion prescribed upon her at birth. A damaging one too, as it has seen her waste years of her life propping up empty corporations.
She is only forced into this realisation after the global financial crisis of 2008 strips her of everything she has been working to earn, and it becomes clear that the promised stability of the American dream isn’t all that stable. As she seeks out a life beyond the boundaries of civilisation she still encounters unexpected problems, but at least there is no boss or politician giving her false reassurances.
We gradually discover that Fern is a widow, having lost her husband years ago, and so as she faces the end of her life she does so with years of preparation. Venturing forth into uninhabited terrain is a practice run for journeying into the great unknown, separating oneself entirely from the comfort of civilisation so that the separation from life becomes easier to accept. In one scene she gets lost among rock formations, and in another, a wild, choppy ocean disturbs the notion that the natural world isn’t always a kind, soothing place. She faces the temptation to settle back into a home and live off a pension, but the pull of the nomad life is too strong, as equally unavoidable as her own death.
Chloe Zhao’s camera shares Fern’s instinctual desire to keep moving, never settling in one place. In its restlessness, movement becomes something other than a necessity to reach a different location, but rather an opportunity to keep seeing, doing, and learning more. Zhao’s tracking shots float around Fern in long takes, sometimes looking ahead, other times off to the side or behind. She often greets people on these journeys, nodding and sharing exchanges with fellow nomads. As one of her friends points out later, nomads never say any permanent goodbyes, but rather just “See you down the road.” Every relationship Fern has or ever has had, including her marriage, is unified by their fleetingness, and thus they all meld into one singularity. Change is the only constant in her life.
Zhao’s magic hour photography delivers some of the most gorgeous images of the year, often capturing the sun just above mountainous horizons as it is setting. It acts as a visual reminder that this is a period of transition for Fern, facing the end of her life without fear or worry. By removing herself from the pressures of ordinary civilisation, she discovers a purer state of being that is more in touch with her mortality, her environment, and her friends. Most significantly though, she begins to recognise that to exist is to live in a state of constant flux. Pretending that corporate America’s arbitrary life instructions will guard against that is foolish. Temporality must be embraced, not shied away from.
