More from the movie corner of Graziella: River of Grass
For the third week in a row, we watch a film by one of the most important indie filmmakers in the US, Kelly Reichardt. Released in 1994, River of Grass was Reichardt’s debut feature, and it’s interesting to see how she already started to play with themes here to which she would later return, even if the execution isn’t quite there yet. Instead of the slow pans and long takes that would become the visual trademark of later films, visual style and editing here are more nervous, perhaps more mainstream. As the film’s undeniably comic tones suggest, the characters in Reichardt’s debut are inconsequential against the backdrop of a much larger world; They exaggerate their own importance—as we all do to a certain degree. River of Grass might not be on the same level as Reichardt’s best work, but it is an intriguing debut nonetheless, so give it a shot…
Watch River of Grass on Kanopy here.
