“Big River Man” (2009) – Review #16
Before I google the fuck out of this film, let me say a few unresearched words. I wouldn’t be surprised if this “Hearts of Darkness” meets “The Big Blue”-documentary is a total fabrication. Probably Martin Strel never swam a single river, over-weight and over-aged. Never drank a single bottle of whiskey while swimming down the Amazon river. Never had a larvae crawl into his brain, never even existed. Maybe the film is just a handful of crazy Slovenians with a wild idea for a mockumentary.
Or maybe every minute is the purest truth.
For the first 30 minutes I was giggling at the movie. After that, the laughs were on me. These filmmakers know exactly what they are doing.
“Martin likes American ambassadors and they like him. They like each other because Martin loves America and they like America too.”
It’s a great movie. I couldn’t help think how it’d be totally different if a Danish editor, composer and text writer had had their hands on the raw material. It’s fantastic to see this completely unexpected piece of documentary film-making coming out of Slovenia.
IMDB: 7.1 of 10 (189 votes) / RT: 92% fresh (25 reviews)/ official site / 100 minutes
Directed by: John Maringouin
See the Lovedox ranking for this film!
I love this film too, and I have a soft spot for Slovenia since my wife and I spent our vacation there in 2006. A wonderful place. But to be technical, while Strel and his son are Slovenian, the film’s director is an American.