Ranches

Film critic David Edelstein reviews the new comedy Casa de mi Padre, starring Will Ferrell. It's a Spanish-language American film created in the style of a telenovela.

The writer inherited his family's ranch, but later sold it when he moved to Iowa for graduate school. Kittredge critiques the belief that humans have the moral authority to develop and tame the American West. This mythology, he says, has led to ecological destruction and the genocide of American Indians. His new collection of essays about the subject is called Owning it All.