"Big River" is a multi-cultural road movie that tells the tale of an unlikely friendship between three characters. Ali, a Muslim from Pakistan, is searching for his estranged wife, Nadia. He gets lost in the middle of the desert soon after arriving in the U.S.. After meeting up with Teppei, a Japanese traveler hitchhiking his way through America, and Sarah, a beautiful white woman from a local trailer park, Ali and his new friends find Nadia living in Phoenix. To his dismay, he discovers she is living with another man. Ali confronts Nadia and tries to force her to return to Pakistan, but she refuses. She prefers her new life in America. Helpless, he goes back to the motel where he is too ashamed to tell Teppei and Sarah; instead he lies and says that his wife will meet him in two days to go home with him. "There are two poles in the cinematic hemispheres. At one pole you aspire to film human culture, local people’s lives, their trivial behaviors, their breath, their 'aura', which have been nourished by the environment – light, wind, the earth, etc. – of their neighborhoods. At the other pole you intend to depict love, friendship, conflict, chase, betrayal, encounter in a uniquely cinematic form which is totally irrelevant to the cultural/racial/linguistic background. Here we see what I'd like to call 'nonnationalism' of cinema. It is blurring the particularity of culture/nationality/locality where the story takes place, and focusing on the excitement of cinematic expression." Funahashi Atsushi
Production: Big River Films (New York), Office Kitano (Tokyo), Bandai Visual, Tokyo FM, TV Asahi, Tokyo Theatre
World Sales: Office Kitano Inc.
Screenplay: Funahashi Atsushi, Eric van den Brulle
Cinematographer: Eric van den Brulle
Composer: Janek Duszynski
Sound: Sergio Sanmiguel
Sound Design: Justin Kawashima
Cast: Joe Odagiri, Kavi Raz, Chloe Snyder
Format/screen ratio: 35mm, Cinemascope, Color
Running time: 105 minutes, 24 frames/sec.
Languages: English, Urdu
