A Will for the Woods

It becomes clear that this isn’t just a documentary that seeks to demystify green burials. It’s one that tries, and largely succeeds, to demystify the process of letting go of life.

While the film also captures many private, sometimes heartbreaking scenes, it takes a lot of time to make its simple point.

Less an introduction to the green-burial movement than a portrait of one man who embraced it after being diagnosed with a terminal illness, A Will for the Woods is more sentimental than journalistic.

It’s possible to admire the four directors’ unflinching depiction of the dying process, but the film is mostly unilluminating and grim — not least because almost all of the deaths discussed are untimely.