The River is Backwards Anyways is a surreal poetry film told across four seasonal poems. It follows Jade as she slips through a hole in a bar bathroom wall and enters the shifting landscape of her subconscious.

The Story:

Inside Jade's fluid inner world, she encounters distorted threads of memory tied to past love and harm. Familiar yet not quite discernible, these encounters reveal repeating patterns of attachment, trust, and deception as Jade tries to make sense of what remains and what has reshaped over time.

Each seasonal poem opens a new emotional corridor and explores the ways our subconscious fears and longings shape how we hold on, protect ourselves, and move through emotional loops. The film moves through cycles of attachment and release, leading Jade toward resilience and quiet transformation.

The Intention Behind the Film:

Memory doesn't move in a straight line. It loops, lingers, and reshapes itself over time, carrying a ghostly presence long after moments have passed. We return to certain moments again and again, hoping they might feel different. At its core, this film is about what it means to face those patterns and imagine them differently. It is about the quiet, difficult process of recognizing what has shaped us and beginning to change our relationship to it.

How We Will Use the Funds:

This is an independent experimental production created with a small team in Portland. Funding will directly support locations, insurance, equipment, set construction, transportation, meals, and post-production so the film’s visual and sonic world can fully take shape.

The Team: