FILM FESTIVAL NEWS: EarthxFilm 2019 connects Texas politics and the environment with Spotlight Screening selection THE RIVER AND THE WALL

EarthxFilm, presented by EarthX (April 19-28), announced today that it’s Spotlight Screening selection for the environmentally-focused film festival will be Ben Masters’ THE RIVER AND THE WALL.

THE RIVER AND THE WALL

The film will screen on Thursday, April 25 at the Perot Museum of Nature and Science (2201 N. Field St.) during a “Green Carpet” gala presentation expected to bring out a combination of environmentalists, filmmakers, and political figures to see a film that looks at the subject of much debate from a uniquely politically non-polarizing angle.

EarthxFilm’s co-Founder/President, Michael Cain, said, “One of the hallmarks of EarthxFilm since our inception three years ago, has been to explore the issues facing our environment from all views and perspectives. Regardless of your politics, we all live in the same world and all agree on the need for clean water, clean air and a better planet for future generations.”

EarthxFilm’s Artistic Director, David Holbrooke, added, “The proposed wall between the U.S. and Mexico is already such a complicated issue but Ben Masters’ film manages to examine and attempt to understand a critical aspect that’s easy to forget – the abundant wildlife that know no borders.”

Masters’ THE RIVER AND THE WALL follows five friends on an immersive adventure through the unknown wilds of the Texas borderlands as they travel 1200 miles from El Paso to the Gulf of Mexico on horses, mountain bikes, and canoes. Inspired by the threat of new border wall construction looms ahead, and what he saw as the urgency of documenting the last remaining wilderness in Texas, Masters recruited NatGeo Explorer Filipe DeAndrade, ornithologist Heather Mackey, river guide Austin Alvarado, and conservationist Jay Kleberg to join him on a two-and-a-half-month journey down 1,200 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border.

The group initially set out to document the borderlands and explore the potential impacts of a wall on the natural environment, but as the wilderness gives way to the more populated and heavily trafficked Lower Rio Grande Valley, they come face-to-face with the human side of the immigration debate and enter uncharted emotional waters.