THE RIVER AND THE WALL

“The River and the Wall” comes on as innocent and glossy as a travelogue, but its scenic delights are the sugar coating on a passionate and spectacularly photographed political message. Traveling 1,200 miles along the Rio Grande, from El Paso to the Gulf of Mexico, the director, Ben Masters, and four friends slowly and genially build an ecologically devastating case against the construction of President Trump’s much-ballyhooed border wall…The adventurers aim to document the possible impact of the proposed barrier on the region’s wildlife and residents; but a more personal, pro-immigration note is struck when two team members recall the emotional toll of growing up with undocumented parents. There’s nothing bullying about these segments. Instead, this casually relaxed documentary is both a vivid message movie and a wonder-filled paean to a singularly beautiful and biodiverse environment. Information slides unobtrusively over frames filled with rare birds and black bears, as Texas farmers and ranchers in the Rio Grande Valley discuss their fear of being sealed off from swaths of their land and access to seasonal labor. This is a region that thrives on the free movement of all kinds of life-forms.” www.newyorktimes.com