The Trouble with Nature

The Trouble with Nature is a highly original period drama set in 1769. Arch conservative philosopher Edmund Burke has fled London, debt collectors and a midlife crisis to go on a grand tour of the Alps and rewrite his book on the Sublime. Accompanied by his long-suffering servant Awak overloaded with creature comforts from civilised London, the pompous bewigged Burke is incongruous in the stunning Alpine scenery. First time director and mountaineer Illum Jacobi assembles breathtaking cinematography, witty dialogue and imagery cleverly satirising the romantic ideals of the period.

‘I am deeply confused by my experiences in the mountains. Sometimes I have felt a mystic connection…other times I felt lost like an alien on my own planet. In an attempt to understand this search for connection [my film] takes us back to the 18th century when people first began to identify the sublime. Edmund Burke, a political philosopher who originated the term ‘sublime’ becomes the victim of these fantasies and is re-imagined in the image of our modern self: a man lost in nature, trying to impose his ego and ambitions on the natural world. ‘The Trouble With Nature’ is a story about that inescapable conflict between the indifference of the natural world and the ambition in our own human nature. A conflict reaching a new and terrifying climax as we speak.’

Illum Jacobi, Director