This Sunday, September 1, 2024 at 9 p.m., Arte broadcasts And in the middle flows a river. A hymn to brotherly love but also to nature, the film was shot in a beautiful green setting in the heart of the United States.
He embodies the America of the great outdoors, fascinating, idealistic and eternal. This Hollywood icon is Robert Redford. If he is more discreet today, the 88-year-old actor and director can be proud of his career. The President’s Men, Out of Africa but also People like everyone else or The man who whispered in the horses’ ears, that he realizes… So many projects on the scale of his country, which earned him the Kennedy Center honors for his contribution to American culture. In addition to his cinematographic career, he has a strong political commitment, particularly to ecology. Because Redford is a nature lover, as evidenced And in the middle flows a riverwhich Arte will broadcast on Sunday, September 1, 2024 at 9 p.m. But where was this drama filmed?
This funny introduction to fly fishing for Brad Pitt
In Missoula, Montana, at the beginning of the 20th century, Norman and Paul live under the thumb of their father John, a strict pastor. Their only hobby: accompanying him every Sunday to fly fishing. The splendid (Oscar-winning) photography by Frenchman Philippe Rousselot contributes greatly to the old-fashioned charm of this falsely tranquil film, carried by the excellent performances of Craig Sheffer and Brad Pitt. The latter collaborates here for the first time with Robert Redford, an experience they would repeat nearly ten years later in Spy Gameby Tony Scott. To prepare for filming, the actor learns the famous fly fishing. The only problem: at that time he is far, very far from a river, in Los Angeles. So he trains… on top of a building!
How did river pollution influence the filming of the movie?
The change of scenery must have been total for Angelina Jolie’s ex-husband, who went to Montana and Wyoming in the summer of 1991 for the filming, in conditions very faithful to the script. But a little less to those of the original story: because And in the middle flows a river is based on a semi-autobiographical short story by Norman Maclean, written in 1976. Between the book’s release and the adaptation project, the places mentioned by the author have changed a lot. The Blackfoot River, among others, has been so polluted that there are no more fish there. The fishing scenes were therefore mainly shot on the Gallatin River and the trout used were not mistreated, as ensured by the Montana Humane Society. Phew!
