Ilisa barbash biography of william hill

Although the cast is mainly a herd of sheep, a recent film delivers a profound portrait of struggling humanity — and a last glimpse of the American frontier.

The documentary “Sweetgrass,” produced by Harvard filmmakers and husband-and-wife team Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Ilisa Barbash, is a moving, gritty, and visually stunning look at the life of some of the last cowboy herders in the American West, where animal, man, and land intersect.

Projecting a subtle intimacy and a rawness that only real life can offer, the film depicts the grueling trek made by a group of ranchers as they herd 3,000 sheep though the Absaroka-Beartooth Mountains in south-central Montana to feed in higher pastures.

The pair met while in graduate school at the University of Southern California in the late 1980s and have since collaborated on projects as varied as “In and Out of Africa,” an examination of the African art trade, and “Made in USA,” a film about sweatshops and child labor in