RIVER
Australia, 2021, 75 minutes, Colour.
Narrated by William Dafoe.
Directed by Jennifer Peedon, Joseph Nizeti.
Beauty. Pessimism. Exhortation.
For more than 10 years, Director Jennifer Peedon, has made significant and beautiful documentaries. She has worked most notably in the Himalayas with Sherpa as Well Is documentaries Mountain Quest, Mountain. (And the writer of this documentary, Robert McFarlane, was a writer of the Mountain documentaries.)
In many ways River is a masterclass in cinema photography. It is also a masterclass in editing such a range of beautiful material. The early part of the film, spoken in quiet tones by Willem Dafoe, indicates the evolution of rain, streams, rivers, and then the interaction between humans and rivers.
All this is captured beautifully in striking images, a delight to watch.
And, as we see in the opening, the Australian Chamber Orchestra is assembling, under the leadership of Richard Tognetti, preparing to play the score, original music, classical music, something of a concerto as we watch.
But, the narration moves us into the 20th century, the human controlling of so many rivers, rivers which are diverted, dammed. And alarming explanations given about dams, the trapping of silt, the release of water without the silt, the lack of nutrient benefit with the waters released, compensated in some way by hydroelectric energy.
And the images go further, close-ups and vast vistas, helicopter and drone material, satellite images, devastation in so many parts of the world, the erratic behaviour of droughts and floods, the commercialisation of the rivers, profitable consequences for the affluent, the poor being deprived of aspects of livelihood.
And the commentary asks towards the end: are we good ancestors? Human history flowing like rivers – and what will human history me in the future downstream? Not that the film is without hope. Some remedies have been put in place, recovery of silt as dam waters are released in full flow, some enriching consequences.
But, along with this, there are still the scenes of devastation, hundreds of stranded fishing dead along a defunct river. But, the rivers flow into the sea, there is evaporation, huge amounts of water in the streams of the clouds, and their returning to the earth.
There is so much to see in a documentary like this – and so much to challenge.
