Nature's Library
Black Diamond, 2010
3:10
Dir: Zoe Slusar
Digital Video
Live action drama
Young Audiences Program
This morality tale about a young girl who discovers a mysterious evergreen that sprouts books can be interpreted on a number of levels and is simply and economically told in a brisk, direct fashion. Nature’s Library also effectively varies its pacing over the short course of three minutes. Zoe Slusar, who wrote and directed the piece, is also its performer and as such does just enough so that her inner psychology remains a mystery to the viewer. Is it ignorance, thirst, greed, Pandora’s curiosity, or some other motivation that drives her to ultimately abuse the Tree of Knowledge? The books on the branches appear to be mostly volumes of popular wisdom and self help and include The Education of Little Tree, On Death and Dying, and Life After Life. The most prominently recognizable volume, along with Aravind Adiga’s Man Booker Prize winning novel The White Tiger, is the first she picks from the tree and the one she buries beneath it toward the end: don Miguel Ruiz’ The Four Agreements. Make what you will of that.
ZOE SLUSAR
Zoe Slusar is a 22-year-old creative artist based out of Black Diamond, Alberta. She began acting, writing and directing in the theatre and
commercials at a very young age, and moved into filmmaking during her final year of high school. She wrote and filmed a number of her own shorts and fell in love with cinematography in the process. Slusar enjoys the creative freedom of writing, directing, acting in, producing and editing her own works in part because it allows her to appreciate and gain experience in all areas of film production. In 2006 she co-founded untitled Productions with her partner Bailey Kerluke and since then has been striving to create refreshing and unique films that offer thoughtful studies of human nature and the world while entertaining and inspiring their audience.
