MOVIE OF THE WEEK July 3, 2026: MARY OLIVER: SAVED BY THE BEAUTY OF THE WORLD

Even if you’re not someone who reads poetry regularly, odds are you’ve heard the line “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” If so, congratulations: You know Mary Oliver’s work! But there was so much more to Oliver’s own wild and precious life than that one oft-quoted excerpt from The Summer Day, as director Sasha Waters makes clear in her thoughtful documentary Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World.

Largely biographical, the film tells Oliver’s story from her childhood in 1930s/’40s Ohio through her adolescence as a budding writer and a young adulthood that led her east, initially to work as an assistant to Edna St. Vincent Millay’s sister and, eventually, to find lasting love in the person of photographer Molly Malone Cook and a longtime home in Provincetown, Mass. Poetry was always Oliver’s passion and her calling, but it wasn’t exactly lucrative, even as she was published in more and more places and won a Pulitzer Prize in 1984. But, mostly, it seemed Oliver wasn’t too bothered about that — as long as she had her beloved outdoors to escape to and observe.

As everyone Waters interviews for the film makes clear, the natural world was where Oliver felt most comfortable and at home throughout her life. She could — and did — spend hours walking in the woods and along the shore, finding inspiration in everything from the tiniest insects to the biggest, fluffiest clouds. Her ability was in using what she observed in her rambles to inspire poems about what it means to be human — to feel, to love, to rejoice, to mourn. In doing so, she amassed legions of fervent fans, from students and academics to celebrities like Stephen Colbert, Maria Shriver, and Oprah.

All three of those well-known personalities appear in the film to share whaat Oliver’s work has meant to them (Colbert gets teary while reciting “The Summer Day”), as do many other faces, both familiar and otherwise. Acerbic filmmaker John Waters, who was close to Oliver and Cook from a young age, brings welcome levity to the mix, while Oliver’s fellow poets discuss her influence on the art form, as well as on them personally. Ultimately, the film makes clear that while Oliver was never one to revel in public attention, she knew she had meaningful things to say — and she was grateful for the chance to say them. — Betsy Bozdech

Team #MOTW’s comments:

Nell Minow: As we are repeatedly told in this documentary, poet Mary Oliver was a very private person. This film respects that privacy, deftly balancing insights into her work, how it was created and how it is received, with insights into her life, reflected more in the reactions of those who knew her than in a recital of her biographical milestones. Best of all, it shares her gorgous poems, beautifully read.

Loren King With elegant simplicity, director Sasha Waters begins her documentary Mary Oliver: Saved By the Beauty of the World with Oliver’s poetry. Stephen Colbert is so emotional he can’t get through one of her best known poems, The Summer Day which segues into Oliver reading Roses, Late Summer before Nick Flynn recites Maybe. Read full review.

Leslie Combemale Mary Oliver was and is beloved by famous folks, as exampled by those featured in the documentary, including Stephen Colbert, John Waters, and Oprah Winfrey. The poet is also appreciated and beloved as much by regular people all over the world. This film will be embraced to the hearts of all of us who already love her, and those of us who have been changed by her beautiful words. More importantly, what Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World can do, though, is introduce her work and life to those who don’t know her. Filmmaker Sasha Waters creates a film anchored in nature, and anchored in the humanism that brings us all together as people, which is to say the visual style, pacing, and flow work to match the way Mary Oliver wrote. At the same time, the film reveals, through interviews and archival footage, what it meant for Oliver be a queer woman and artist living fearlessly and authentically in the 20th century.