The Cinema of Robert Lundahl

Unconquering the Last Frontier, Robert Lundahl, National PBS, Free Speech TV, Theatrical/Festivals. Distribution, Zeiden Media, Agence.

Song on the Water, National PBS, Robert Lundahl, Long House Assn., Theatrical/Festivals. Distribution, Zeiden Media, Agence.

Who Are My People, Theatrical/Festivals, 6 states. Robert Lundahl, La Cuna de Aztlán Sacred Sites Protection Circle. Distribution, Agence.

We are often told the story the American West ended when the frontier was closed. But look closer, and you will see that the West was never fully won, lost, or settled.

It is being reclaimed every day—in the halls of the high courts, on the ancestral waters of the Pacific, and on the undammed rivers of the Pacific Northwest.

Shot over the course of a full year on Washington’s Olympic Peninsula, Harvest Dreams is a profound reflection on what it means to stay rooted. As the region shifts from commodity agriculture to niche organic farming, four families fight to keep their legacies alive.

PayDirt is a brutal, unblinking investigation into institutional fraud and the radioactive legacy of the Cold War. Set against the plunging economic reality of the Great Recession, the film uncovers a devastating pattern of malfeasance: government and military brass "cooking the books" to fast-track the decommissioning of California's Superfund sites.

Robert Lundahl’s films are the result of what Swiss Psychiatrist and Founder of Analytical Psychology Carl Jung refers to as synchronicity, the fortuitous turning of events, circumstances and opportunities, which, in retrospect, reveal the deeper archetypal insights of resonant truths. Synchronicity acts as the 'meaningful coincidence'..."It is the nature of art through which the artist—a 'Knight of the Roundtable' slaying the dragons of personal creation—stumbles upon an individualized “holy grail.” Synchronicity acts as the 'meaningful coincidence' that Jung and Campbell both emphasized—where the external world seems to mirror an internal state.

In the framing of Comparative Mythologist, Joseph Campbell, Professor of Literature at Sarah Lawrence College for over 40 years, the knight/artist then completes the journey by returning to an original state or original community with the gifts of knowledge, which in retrospect, hold the keys to an expansive and unfettered wisdom. These "fortuitous turnings" aren't just lucky; they are seen as the Collective Unconscious breaking through into physical reality to provide a "nudge" or a revelation.

Campbell often linked these moments to his famous mantra, “Following Your Bliss.” He suggested that when you follow your true path, "doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be," which is essentially synchronicity in action.

It suggests that the event is a bridge between one’s personal experience and universal truth, framing the filmmaker not just as a technician, but as a modern mythmaker.

Dedicated to Archa Anderson Lundahl, Sarah Lawrence Alum, Joseph Campbell student, and my mother.

Dedicated also to Juliette Anthony, daughter of a Sarah Lawrence alum, Research Librarian, UCLA, and Harvard University. Philanthropist and Initiator of the Anthony Prize, The Rose Foundation, Oakland, CA.

And dedicated to Alfredo Acosta Figueroa, Author, Historian, Educator, and Chemehuevi Tribe Cultural Monitor.

Dedicated to Beatrice Charles and Adeline Smith, Klallam elders, lexicographers, activists, and cultural preservationists.

Dedicated to Tim King, USMC, Award Winning Journalist, Founder, Salem-News.com, GlobalNewsCentre.com.

Dedicated to Louis Sahagun, Staff Writer, Los Angeles Times.