Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions

A concert film in which an album is played from beginning to end. Taylor Swift released an album in 2020. It was recorded during the pandemic; she was never in the same room as the two people she wrote and produced it with, and the files went back and forth over the internet. This film brings the three of them together for the first time. The place is a studio in the woods in upstate New York. The structure is simple: seventeen songs in order, played live. Between them the three sit and talk. The talk is the real value of the film. Where the songs came from is described: which line was written first, which character was taken from whom, which section was finished in one night. How a trilogy of three linked songs was built is explained in detail. The sound and the image are kept plain. There is no stage and no audience; a room, a few instruments and natural light. What the film is interested in is not performance but writing: it does not promote an album, it shows how one was made. Jack Antonoff and Aaron Dessner appear; Bon Iver joins one song from a distance. Taylor Swift directed. Who it is for: anyone who listens to the album and is curious about the technical side of songwriting. Who it is not for: anyone expecting a concert film; there is no show here, only a quiet room recording.