# Days of Heaven
**Days of Heaven** is a 1978 American drama film written and directed by [Terrence Malick](https://www.edgepedia.org/terrence-malick), his second feature after *Badlands* (1973). It tells of a Chicago steelworker who accidentally kills his supervisor and flees with his girlfriend and his little sister to the Texas panhandle, where they find work harvesting wheat on the land of a stoic farmer; a love triangle, a swarm of locusts, and a fire follow[1](https://www.criterion.com/films/213-days-of-heaven) • [22](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/56267-DAYS-OF-HEAVEN). The film stars [Richard Gere](https://www.edgepedia.org/richard-gere), Brooke Adams, Sam Shepard, and [Linda Manz](https://www.edgepedia.org/linda-manz), was photographed by Néstor Almendros with additional photography by Haskell Wexler, and won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography[1](https://www.criterion.com/films/213-days-of-heaven) • [2](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077405/awards/). It is widely regarded as one of the most visually striking American films of the 1970s[3](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/6bf4f6d0-216d-5274-b2c9-51879969bac9/days-of-heaven).
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Release | 13 September 1978, Paramount Pictures; running time 94 minutes; cost $2.5 million[4](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/days-heaven) |
| Director and writer | Terrence Malick, his second feature after *Badlands* (1973)[3](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/6bf4f6d0-216d-5274-b2c9-51879969bac9/days-of-heaven) |
| Cast | Richard Gere (Bill), Brooke Adams (Abby), Sam Shepard (the farmer), Linda Manz (Linda)[1](https://www.criterion.com/films/213-days-of-heaven) |
| Setting | Texas panhandle wheat farm in the mid-1910s, before American entry into World War I[1](https://www.criterion.com/films/213-days-of-heaven) • [5](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven) |
| Principal photography | Alberta, Canada, over 73 days in the fall of 1976[6](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781441140272_A25073067/preview-9781441140272_A25073067.pdf) |
| Major awards | Oscar for Best Cinematography (Néstor Almendros); Cannes Best Director 1979; New York Film Critics Circle Best Director 1978; National Film Registry 2007[2](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077405/awards/) |
| Aftermath | Malick did not direct another film for 20 years, until *The Thin Red Line* (1998)[7](https://www.afi.com/news/afi-movie-club-days-of-heaven/) |
## Spoilers
### Story
Bill (Richard Gere) works in a Chicago steel mill, where an argument with his foreman, unheard above the roar of the furnaces, ends with the foreman knocked down and Bill fleeing the city[5](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven). He leaves with his girlfriend Abby (Brooke Adams) and his young sister Linda (Linda Manz), the three traveling atop boxcars with other migrant laborers to a Texas wheat farm[5](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven). For reasons of propriety, Bill and Abby pretend to be brother and sister[5](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven).
The wealthy young farmer ([Sam Shepard](https://www.edgepedia.org/sam-shepard)) is drawn to Abby, and when Bill overhears a doctor say the farmer has perhaps a year to live, he encourages Abby to accept the farmer's marriage proposal, expecting an inheritance[5](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven) • [8](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-days-of-heaven-1978). The scheme fails on both ends: the farmer's health revives, Abby begins to fall in love with her husband, and the farmer comes to suspect that the supposed siblings are lovers[5](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven). A plague of locusts descends on the harvest, an accidentally started fire sweeps the wheat fields, and in the aftermath Bill kills the farmer in self-defense before the three flee once more[5](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven).
The story is told largely through images, with a voice-over narration by Linda that drifts in and out of the action, sometimes knowing nothing and at other times everything, its sentences sometimes left unfinished[9](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/555-days-of-heaven-on-earth-as-it-is-in-heaven). Malick invoked [Henry James](https://www.edgepedia.org/henry-james)'s *What Maisie Knew* as a model for the child's commentary[5](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven).
## Production
After the success of *Badlands*, Malick agreed to work with producers Bert and Harold Schneider and [Paramount Pictures](https://www.edgepedia.org/paramount-pictures)[6](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781441140272_A25073067/preview-9781441140272_A25073067.pdf). The working title was *Stay Hungry*[10](https://catalog.afi.com/film/56267-). Scheduling conflicts forced [John Travolta](https://www.edgepedia.org/john-travolta) out of the production, and Richard Gere was cast as Bill[10](https://catalog.afi.com/film/56267-).
**Location and design.** Although the story is set in Texas, the exteriors were shot at Whiskey Gap, a ghost town on the Alberta prairie, with a final scene at Heritage Park Historical Village in Calgary[11](https://www.sam-shepard.com/daysofheaven.html). Production designer [Jack Fisk](https://www.edgepedia.org/jack-fisk) built the grand Victorian farmhouse that looms over the wheat fields, working in Alberta with four weeks before cameras rolled; he described Malick as a director who never uses storyboards and is concerned above all about light[12](https://apnews.com/article/90c5b0a569ae9653985252176d7ead7a). Malick also bought the rights to a farmer's land and its crops and used vintage wheat-threshing equipment from the Western Development Museum in [Saskatchewan](https://www.edgepedia.org/saskatchewan) to recreate a pre-World War I harvest[7](https://www.afi.com/news/afi-movie-club-days-of-heaven/).
**Cinematography.** Malick and the Spanish-born cinematographer Néstor Almendros, known for his work with the French directors [François Truffaut](https://www.edgepedia.org/francois-truffaut) and Eric Rohmer, worked mostly with natural light, shooting heavily during the magic hour near sunset[13](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-front-row/the-enigmatic-artistry-of-terrence-malick) • [14](https://theasc.com/article/photographing-days-of-heaven/). Almendros held that period films should have less light, with illumination coming from windows as people actually lived[15](https://www.moma.org/explore/inside_out/2014/08/05/terrence-malicks-days-of-heaven/). Haskell Wexler completed the final two weeks of shooting following the visual precedents Almendros had established[6](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781441140272_A25073067/preview-9781441140272_A25073067.pdf). Wexler later said that more than half the footage was shot by him, but he received only an "additional photography" credit, which made him ineligible to share the Academy Award[7](https://www.afi.com/news/afi-movie-club-days-of-heaven/) • [16](https://jpkcinemaadventures.com/2013/03/13/days-of-heaven-1978/).
**Method and editing.** As filming progressed, Malick felt free to improvise, focusing on natural elements and asking actors to play scenes without dialogue[6](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781441140272_A25073067/preview-9781441140272_A25073067.pdf). He shot material not always centered on the lead actors but on the land, animals, and small spectacles with groups of extras, intending to find the film's final form in postproduction[9](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/555-days-of-heaven-on-earth-as-it-is-in-heaven). Linda Manz recited and improvised some sixty hours of voice-over, from which Malick selected the narration[13](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-front-row/the-enigmatic-artistry-of-terrence-malick). Malick then spent two years in the editing room with editor Billy Weber, reducing elaborate dialogue scenes to a line or two and cutting to natural phenomena; Weber recalled that when the material was cut as a full dialogue movie it was not working, and that the film's style and rhythm were discovered in postproduction[9](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/555-days-of-heaven-on-earth-as-it-is-in-heaven) • [17](https://cinemontage.org/billy-weber-days-heaven/).
## Visual style and reception
Critics from 1979 onward described the film as "pictorial" and "like a painting," and its magic-hour lighting and landscape photography drew repeated comparisons to the paintings of [Andrew Wyeth](https://www.edgepedia.org/andrew-wyeth) and [Edward Hopper](https://www.edgepedia.org/edward-hopper)[18](https://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/34957/13/BirdKE_ETDPITT2018.pdf) • [3](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/6bf4f6d0-216d-5274-b2c9-51879969bac9/days-of-heaven). The Guardian's 2024 review noted that the film established Malick's reverence for fading dusk light and his method of shooting a great deal and shaping the movie in the edit[19](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2024/feb/01/days-of-heaven-review-malicks-early-masterwork-heralds-a-rarefied-visionary).
The film won the [Academy Award for Best Cinematography](https://www.edgepedia.org/academy-award-for-best-cinematography) and was nominated for Best Costume Design, Best Sound, and Best Original Score for Ennio Morricone's music[2](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077405/awards/). Malick won Best Director at the 1979 Cannes Film Festival and from the New York Film Critics Circle[2](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077405/awards/) • [4](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/days-heaven). On the review aggregator Metacritic it holds a score of 94, labeled universal acclaim, based on 20 critic reviews[20](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/days-of-heaven-re-release/), and it was ranked joint 152nd in the 2022 [Sight and Sound](https://www.edgepedia.org/sight-and-sound) critics' poll of the greatest films of all time[3](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/6bf4f6d0-216d-5274-b2c9-51879969bac9/days-of-heaven). The Library of Congress added it to the [National Film Registry](https://www.edgepedia.org/national-film-registry) in 2007[2](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077405/awards/).
## Place in Malick's career
With hindsight, critics have argued that *Days of Heaven*, not *Badlands*, truly announced Malick's characteristic style: where the debut was tightly scripted, the second film was deliberately loose, and Malick carried its method of discovering the film in postproduction into all his later work[9](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/555-days-of-heaven-on-earth-as-it-is-in-heaven). Despite the acclaim and awards, he did not direct another film for two decades, until *The Thin Red Line* in 1998, apparently turning down many projects during the interval[7](https://www.afi.com/news/afi-movie-club-days-of-heaven/) • [15](https://www.moma.org/explore/inside_out/2014/08/05/terrence-malicks-days-of-heaven/). A 4K restoration supervised by Malick, camera operator John Bailey, and Billy Weber was released by the Criterion Collection and screened in the Venice Classics section in 2023[1](https://www.criterion.com/films/213-days-of-heaven) • [21](https://www.labiennale.org/en/cinema/2023/venice-classics/days-heaven).
## References
1. [Days of Heaven, The Criterion Collection](https://www.criterion.com/films/213-days-of-heaven)
2. [Days of Heaven (1978) – Awards, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077405/awards/)
3. [Days of Heaven (1978), British Film Institute](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/6bf4f6d0-216d-5274-b2c9-51879969bac9/days-of-heaven)
4. [Days of Heaven, Encyclopedia.com](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/days-heaven)
5. [Richard Combs, "The eyes of Texas: Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven," Sight and Sound, Spring 1979 (BFI archive)](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/eyes-texas-terrence-malicks-days-heaven)
6. [Terrence Malick (book preview), Continuum](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781441140272_A25073067/preview-9781441140272_A25073067.pdf)
7. [AFI Movie Club: Days of Heaven, American Film Institute](https://www.afi.com/news/afi-movie-club-days-of-heaven/)
8. [Roger Ebert, "Days of Heaven" Great Movies review, rogerebert.com](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-days-of-heaven-1978)
9. [Adrian Martin, "Days of Heaven: On Earth as It Is in Heaven," The Criterion Collection](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/555-days-of-heaven-on-earth-as-it-is-in-heaven)
10. [Days of Heaven (1978), AFI Catalog](https://catalog.afi.com/film/56267-)
11. [Days of Heaven, The Sam Shepard Web Site](https://www.sam-shepard.com/daysofheaven.html)
12. [Inside the enduring movie homes of Jack Fisk, production design legend, AP News](https://apnews.com/article/90c5b0a569ae9653985252176d7ead7a)
13. [The Enigmatic Artistry of Terrence Malick, The New Yorker](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-front-row/the-enigmatic-artistry-of-terrence-malick)
14. [Photographing 'Days of Heaven,' American Cinematographer](https://theasc.com/article/photographing-days-of-heaven/)
15. [Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven, MoMA](https://www.moma.org/explore/inside_out/2014/08/05/terrence-malicks-days-of-heaven/)
16. [Days of Heaven (1978) review, JPK's Adventures in Cinema](https://jpkcinemaadventures.com/2013/03/13/days-of-heaven-1978/)
17. [Billy Weber on 'Days of Heaven,' CineMontage](https://cinemontage.org/billy-weber-days-heaven/)
18. [Bird, K. E., PhD dissertation on Days of Heaven, University of Pittsburgh](https://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/34957/13/BirdKE_ETDPITT2018.pdf)
19. [Peter Bradshaw, Days of Heaven review, The Guardian, 1 February 2024](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2024/feb/01/days-of-heaven-review-malicks-early-masterwork-heralds-a-rarefied-visionary)
20. [Days of Heaven Reviews, Metacritic](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/days-of-heaven-re-release/)
21. [Biennale Cinema 2023, Days of Heaven, La Biennale di Venezia](https://www.labiennale.org/en/cinema/2023/venice-classics/days-heaven)
22. [56267 DAYS OF HEAVEN, catalog.afi.com](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/56267-DAYS-OF-HEAVEN)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Drama and biographical films (individual works) › Drama films 1970s › Released 1975 to 1979*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license