Inspired by the Book The Everglades: River of Grass by Marjory Stoneman Douglas, the documentary River of Grass is the feature debut from artist and filmmaker Sasha Wortzel. The film is described as an “ode to the Everglades, told through the writings of Marjory Stoneman Douglas, and those who today call the region home.”
Featured in the documentary are Betty Osceola, Marjory Stoneman Douglas, Houston R. Cypress, Leon Howell, Kina Phillips, Steve Messam, Donna Kalil, Deanna Kalil, Heather Barron, Malka Spektor, Timothy Navin, Bart Stokes, Haylee Stokes, and Colton Stokes
The film made its World Premiere at True/False 2025, and its Florida Premiere at Miami Film Festival followed by Sarasota Film Festival.
Next up, it will make its International Premiere at Hot Docs on April 28 & 30, and NYC Premiere at Margaret Mead Film Festival on May 4.
River of Grass is a present-day reimagining of Marjory Stoneman Douglas’s groundbreaking book, “The Everglades: River of Grass,” (1947), which transformed the public’s understanding of the area from worthless swamps to an essential source of freshwater, enabling the ecosystem to endure, just barely, today.
In the wake of a hurricane, Douglas visits filmmaker Sasha Wortzel in a dream and catalyzes a prismatic study of a wilderness that is home to a rich history and a site of resistance in the face of climate collapse. Seeking a way forward, Wortzel reads Douglas’s book and embarks on a deep listening walk through the Everglades with Miccosukee educator Betty Osceola. The intertwined voices of the narrator, Betty, and Marjory transport the audience across the Everglades, past and present. Along the way, we meet a mother taking on the polluting sugar industry; a family of crab fishermen who have fished in the Everglades for six generations; a mother-daughter team who venture out nightly to remove invasive snakes wreaking havoc on the ecosystem; and a two-spirit Miccosukee environmentalist and poet, among others.
Interweaving Douglas’s writing, personal narration, stunning present-day verité, and haunting archival footage, River of Grass reveals how this country’s origin story haunts and inextricably shapes contemporary American life, while asking how we might weather coming storms better together.
Sasha Wortzel’s photographs related to River of Grass are currently on view in New York International Center of Photography (ICP) exhibition “To Conjure: New Archives in Recent Photography.” The closing weekend of the show coincides with the film’s NY premiere at the Margaret Mead Film Festival on May 4.