There are films that look reminiscent of a particular time period, and films that look as though they were actually shot in the time period in which they are set.Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Conformist (1970; available on DVD from Paramount Home Video) takes place in the 1930’s and early 1940’s, yet cinematographer Vittorio Storaro managed to make this film look as though it could have been filmed during these respective decades.Likewise, Terrence Malick’s Days of Heaven, filmed in 1976 and released in 1978, takes place circa 1916 and the resulting imagery is like stepping back in time.
Bill, played by a 27 year-old Richard Gere, is a day laborer in a Chicago steel mill (filmed in Los Angeles) who has an argument with one of the bosses and inadvertently kills him, causing him to flee to the wheat fields of the Texas Panhandle (Alberta, Canada doubling as Texas) with his out-of-wedlock lover Abby (Brooke Adams) and his younger sister Linda (Linda Manz).With Linda’s help, Bill and Abby present themselves as brother and sister and are hired as seasonal workers on a farm owned by a wealthy farmer (playwright Sam Shepard) who is ill and who may or may not live much longer.Since Bill has been poor his whole life and has never known an existence that was not arduous, he encourages Abby to respond to the farmer’s affections and marry him in the hopes of inheriting his farm and money when he dies.Abby agrees, and initially the plan works as Bill, Abby and Linda enjoy life as they have never known it, experiencing the film’s title by relaxing and playing games, and living a life free of toil, worry and physical labor.At some point, however, their masquerade becomes apparent and things take a turn for the worse when several tragedies transpire and their lives are forever altered.