THE SAME RIVER TWICE International Documentary Competition

Working as river guides for much of the 1970s, director Robb Moss and his friends lived an unscheduled, communal (often naked), outdoor life committed to counter-cultural ideals.

Cutting between images of a month-long river trip filmed 25 years ago and the current lives of five people from that trip, the film explores bodies, the passage of time and living with one’s life choices. The group consists of Da.nny, married and the mother of two who had her first child at 41; Jeff, father of two, divorced from Cathy, works as a writer. and liberal radio talk show host; Cathy, mother of two, divorced from Jeff, the mayor of Ashland, Oregon; Barry, father of three, director of a small town psychiatric hospital, mayor of Placerville, California; and Jim, no children, still a river guide (except for a brief period when he considered becoming a dentist).

The film is an evocative and riveting portrait of a group of friends and the choices they made in life. Crediting myth and poetry from memories and images brings the audience along on the river’s pull into the present. Speaking candidly to Moss with, charming exuberance and sober reflections, the way close friends will folk, this familiarity creates a Universal appeal.