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American Dendrite @ Savoy Lumière
Phoenix Theatres Savoy 16 + IMAX
232 Burwash Ave.
Savoy, Illinois
(217) 530-4671
Category
Hours
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Director Adam Marshall Present and his crew follow the waterways from
Chicago to the Louisiana bayou, tracing the Chicago River
to the Mississippi and eventually out to the ocean.
Along the way, they interview people they meet, capturing intimate
stories from communities along the river. Each participant responds
to reflections from people interviewed upstream, creating a flowing
chain of conversation that explores climate, culture, and consciousness across the region.
If that wasn’t enough, Present captures everything on vintage
Super 8mm, lending a sense of timelessness to river life.
The film plays like a mixture of Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain,
and Studs Terkel, with Present taking the role of famed archivist Alan Lomax.
The title American Dendrite refers to branching networks that carry
signals or flow. Like a dendrite in the brain or the branching waterways
of the Mississippi River system, the film follows how stories, memories,
and ideas move downstream between communities, forming a living
network across America.