What if our final act could give something back to the earth? That’s the question Park City director and producer J.J. Gerber aims to answer with his documentary feature, “The Life We Leave.”
The film follows Michael Truman, a finance guy who seizes on an opportunity in the funeral industry to turn humans into soil.
“He sees a business opportunity there,” Gerber said on KPCW’s “Local News Hour” Oct. 8. “But as he starts to open his company, he understands the science, he gets all of that stuff, but as he starts to open his company he comes face to face with grief and grieving people.”
Through his two funeral directors, Truman learns what it really means to work in the industry.
Gerber said he was inspired to make the film after his mom, who was an avid gardener died in 2018.
“We kind of had a transactional experience with the funeral industry. You know, ‘Here's your mom's ashes. Would you like to buy a keychain?’” he said. “And that did not feel good, and we didn't want to buy the keychains.”
A few years later human compositing was legalized in Washington State, where Gerber now lives. That’s where he met Truman and took a tour of his facility.
“It was empty, just like a big empty warehouse. And he took me on this tour, and so I had to kind of use my imagination,” he said. “Like this is where the straw is going to be, this is where the alfalfa is going to be, this is where we're going to put the pods of all the bodies.”
Five years later, Gerber’s directorial debut is ready for the big screen.
“The Life We Leave” premiered at South by Southwest earlier this year. It will have its Utah premier on the opening night of the Park City Film Festival at the Jim Santy Auditorium Oct. 23.
Tickets are going fast for the opening night screening.
Festival passes are sold out but individual tickets are still available. Prices go up Monday, Oct. 12.
