Movies into Film
THE SAME RIVER TWICE
Directed by Robb Moss
USA, 2003
The unforgettable moment in The Same River Twice comes when Danny, a 48-year-old aerobics instructor, dances before a roomful of 7-year-old girls. Oblivious to their presence, Danny loses herself in the pleasure of her own body. The camera alights on the girls’ eyes for only a few seconds, long enough to register how Danny’s energy force stimulates, even overwhelms, her young friends. In a movie built (in a sense) around flashbacks, there we have a flash forward—an intimation that these awed second-graders have just had their first vision of the womanhood in store for them. The spectacular, slightly grainy 1970s footage of white waves cresting bright green waters alone makes The Same River Twice worthwhile. The movie isn’t a masterpiece; the present-day scenes initially seem like bland muck in contrast to the euphoric naked hippie era. Yet director Robb Moss gradually splinters suburbanite shellac. There’s a clip where his friend Jeff, a former river guide turned public radio talk show pundit, parades around shirtless. The man wants us to see how buff he still is decades later, how proud he is to be so buff, and bitter over it at the same time. – NPT
September 2003
Movies into Film
© N.P. Thompson, 2004
npt [at] moviesintofilm [dot] com