Review of Same River Twice

When the director, Scott Featherstone, was in boy scouts I was a part of his troop. Our scout master and Scott's father masterminded the notion of taking the boys down the Middle Fork of the Salmon for a "superactivity". A lot of water has clearly passed under the "Split Creek Bridge" since then, but I felt a lot of the old familiar emotions watching "Same River Twice". Singing songs from the radio, waterfights on the river, making and re-newing connections, even close calls and dramatic rescues, all memories of those boyhood raft trips. I've since gone on to guide kayaks and rafts and live my life in another part of the country. I lost contact with Scott Featherstone until this movie. Someone else might not feel the intense connection to the message of this movie, but I do. I lived it. Scott has captured those days in a masterful way.

The real star of this movie and what showed best through the film was the majesty and grace that is Idaho's whitewater and her back-country. Gorgeously shot, every scene could be a postcard, and none of it exaggerates Idaho's beauty in the slightest, if anything the movie understates it. People have asked me over the years where my home is. If it is true that your home is where your heart is, no matter where my house has stood, my home has been the Middle Fork. My thanks to Scott and his superb film for re-enforcing that fact and helping me to re-connect with my home, if just for a little while.