《回水》紀(jì)錄片帶你乘獨(dú)木舟穿越最不可能的荒野地區(qū)

《回水》紀(jì)錄片帶你乘獨(dú)木舟穿越最不可能的荒野地區(qū)

The new documentary "Back Water" asks a lot of questions, but it mostly leaves the answers to the viewer. It's those lingering questions that kept this quiet, even relaxing, viewing experience stuck in my mind for days afterwards.

新紀(jì)錄片《回水》提出了很多問題，但大部分問題的答案都留給了觀眾。正是這些揮之不去的問題，讓我在接下來的幾天里一直保持著這種安靜，甚至放松的觀影體驗(yàn)。

Clocking in at a mere 72 minutes, "Back Water," seems at first like a simple environmental travel documentary, if set in a unusual locale for such a project.

在短短72分鐘的《回水》中，如果故事發(fā)生在一個(gè)不同尋常的地方，乍一看就像是一部簡單的環(huán)保旅游紀(jì)錄片。

'Back Water' explores a wilderness area that's the literal backyard of millions of people — the Hackensack River and New Jersey Meadowlands. (Photo: Jon Cohrs, 'Back Water')

Director Jon Cohrs wanted to take his skills and point of view as a former wilderness guide at Glacier National Park in Alaska and bring them to a place where they hadn't been applied before: The wetlands adjacent to the most densely populated area in the United States. He spent 10 days navigating the Hackensack River into the New Jersey Meadowlands.

導(dǎo)演喬恩·科爾斯曾在阿拉斯加的冰川國家公園擔(dān)任荒野向?qū)?，他想利用自己的技能和觀點(diǎn)，把它們帶到一個(gè)以前從未去過的地方:美國人口最密集地區(qū)附近的濕地。他花了10天的時(shí)間航行于哈肯薩克河到新澤西州的牧場。

But this isn't a man-alone-in-the-wilderness situation. Cohrs brings along a crew that includes Nicola Twilley, a contributing writer at The New Yorker who hosts Gastropod, a podcast about food science and history; the hunter and hairdresser Sara Jensen; the cook and writer Erin Tolman; the lawyer Gillian Cassell-Stiga, who was raised in New Jersey just a few miles from the wetlands; Derek Hallquist, the film's lead cameraman and director of "Denial,"a film about 2018 Vermont gubernatorial candidate Christine Hallquist; and the sound person, Patrick of "Get Me Roger Stone."

但這并不是一個(gè)人在野外的情況。科爾斯帶來了一批工作人員，包括Nicola Twilley，《紐約客》的撰稿人，主持美食播客，一個(gè)關(guān)于食物科學(xué)和歷史的播客;獵人兼美發(fā)師莎拉·詹森;廚師兼作家艾琳·托爾曼;在新澤西長大的律師吉莉安·卡斯?fàn)?斯蒂加，離濕地只有幾英里;德里克·霍爾奎斯特是該片的首席攝影師，也是《否認(rèn)》的導(dǎo)演?！斗裾J(rèn)》講述的是2018年佛蒙特州州長候選人克莉絲汀·霍爾奎斯特的故事;還有《給我羅杰·斯通》的配音演員帕特里克。"

What is wilderness?

荒野是什么?

While the seven-person team spent a lot of time on the water, they did step on dry land to make camp, pick up supplies, and sometimes, to explore. (Photo: Jon Cohrs, 'Back Water')

Why would a former Alaskan wilderness guide choose to lovingly document a journey down a river that's crisscrossed by busy highways and commuter train lines, and whose shores are home to abandoned factories? "I really wanted to look at our experience of wilderness," Cohrs said in a virtual panel discussion via the New York Hall of Science. "It was an opportunity to challenge our beliefs around this space as well as take on the naive idea of navigating down this river and camping like we would if we were at one of these famous wilderness areas."

為什么一位前阿拉斯加荒野向?qū)?huì)選擇深情地記錄下這條河流的旅程?這條河流縱橫交錯(cuò)，繁忙的高速公路和通勤火車線路縱橫交錯(cuò)，河岸上坐落著廢棄的工廠。“我真的很想看看我們?cè)谝巴獾慕?jīng)歷，”科爾斯在紐約科學(xué)館的虛擬小組討論中說。“這是一個(gè)挑戰(zhàn)我們對(duì)這個(gè)空間的信念的機(jī)會(huì)，同時(shí)也讓我們有了一個(gè)天真的想法，那就是沿著這條河航行，就像我們?cè)谶@些著名的荒野地區(qū)露營一樣。”

Whenever the camera more closely focuses on the group's activities — packing up the boats, cooking meals over a camp stove, looking at an interesting plant, or in one case, a muskrat skull, you can forget they were often just a few thousand feet from a mall or big-box store. It does feel like a wilderness space, and when the camera pulls back to show the larger scene — maybe a shopping complex or multiple bridges in the distance, or in one shot, the lights of Manhattan at night — you are reminded this isn't the wilderness we're used to seeing.

當(dāng)鏡頭更近距離地聚焦于該組織的活動(dòng)時(shí)——準(zhǔn)備船、在野營爐上做飯、看一種有趣的植物，或者看一只麝鼠頭骨，你可能會(huì)忘記它們通常離商場或大賣場只有幾千英尺。它感覺像是荒野空間,當(dāng)鏡頭拉回顯示更大的場景,也許是遠(yuǎn)處的購物中心或許多橋梁,或是曼哈頓晚上的燈光的鏡頭——提醒我們這不是我們習(xí)慣的曠野。

The film ultimately makes a strong case to me that natural places, especially waterways, can serve as spaces where city residents who might not be able to go hundreds of miles away to a lake or to the mountains. And once they cherish a place, or even just understand and respect how and why it works as a water filtration system, wildlife habitat, and storm-surge buffer, they might more likely to protect it.

這部電影最終做出了有力的證明。對(duì)我來說,自然的地方,尤其是水道,可以作為無法去數(shù)百英里外的湖或山上的城市居民的空間。一旦他們珍惜一個(gè)地方，甚至只是理解和尊重它作為水過濾系統(tǒng)、野生動(dòng)物棲息地和風(fēng)暴緩沖帶的工作方式和原因，他們就會(huì)更有可能保護(hù)它。