The gorgeous Dolomite region provides the setting for Olmi's gentlest dissection of the synergy among the natural, spiritual, and economic worlds, rendered as a playful ecological parable–cum–children's fable. A retired military colonel inherits a huge forest on the condition that he protect it from harm. The lure of easy money quickly distracts him, and he decides to cut down the ancient trees to sell their wood; the denizens of the forest (including sprites, spirits, and the trees themselves), however, have other ideas. “I prefer a relationship with reality, not reconstructed in a studio,” Olmi once noted, adding, “A real tree is continually creative; an artificial tree isn't.” This magical work, filmed entirely in the San Marco woods (a national preserve), not only embraces the purity of the natural world, but passes that passion on for every generation to experience.