THE RIVER a documentary film project

THE RIVER

A documentary film project

Directed by: Bo Landin Director of Photography: Matt Arkins III Produced by: Scandinature Films USA Inc.

THE RIVER

“Let our voices be heard”

This feature documentary film follows a drop of water as it melts from the Rocky Mountain snowpack in Colorado until it finally evaporates in the river estuary in Mexico. A drop that formes one of the most spectacular large rivers in the world, becomes a trickle of water and never reaches the ocean. On the way the water is used and misused by people in several states. More than 40 million people is depending on the water from the river. They behave like there is no limit to the water. Conflicts arise, as the population grows and climate change pushes the region into the worst drought in 1 200 years. History shows that climate change more than a thousand years ago forced people, the Anasazi and other indigenous tribes, to become climate refuges and leave the area. Will history repeat itself?

Manifest Destiny, a phrase coined in 1845, is the idea that the United States is destined—by God, its advocates believed—to expand its dominion and a philosophy of exploitation of nature across the entire North American continent. The philosophy drove 19th-century U.S. territorial expansion and was used to justify the forced removal of Native Americans and other groups from their homes. In the 21st century, will Manifest Destiny also dictate the fate of the river, and again result in in the dislocation and brutal mistreatment of Native Americans?

Will water wars, serious clashes due to conflicting demands on shrinking water resources, thrust farmers against city dwellers, one state against another, mostly white people building ever larger cities in drought-stricken areas against indigenous peoples who’s rights continuously have been ignored?

Voices eco between the slick rock walls along the river; voices of desperation and vanishing hopes. In this film the river has it’s own voice.

There are also all the human voices that love the river for what it does and the role it plays in society - for everyone living along its course and who love and enjoy all it has to offer. The river means life in more than one way.

Does the river have rights to speak for itself? And when the river speaks, will someone listen?

“I think it’s a 100-year tragedy. By not including such an important stakeholder on the river, we set the system up for failure,” said Heather Tanana, a research professor at the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law’s Stegner Center.

“One of the biggest things with our settlement is hope for the future and getting this not for us at this time but for the generations ahead,” Clark. Part of the reason the Hualapai Tribe did not prioritize discussions on water rights long ago is because tribal members believed that water came with their land.”

Tribal Chairman Damon Clarke “Until you start to deal with the inequities or the injustice, you can never really have any momentum going forward,” Shaun Chapoose, Ute Indian Tribe

“The tribe was encouraged by a new conservation plan released by three water agencies in Southern California, a signal that “others were taking this crisis seriously or trying to do something.”

Jason Hauter, Gila River Indian Community

“There’s a reason why the tribe doesn’t have much water and why almost all the water in the region is being used by white people. Look at who got the money, the Central Utah Project. Who got the water? Ask yourself that and ask, ‘does this look fair to you?”

Daniel McCool, professor emeritus at the University of Utah

Denver lawyer James Flores-Williams argues the Colorado River is dying — "there's not enough of the river to go around." "What we say is that, 'no, these kinds of relationships that are going to result in the death of the river, and therefore the death of everything that depends upon it,"

“The Navajo Nation has a dire need for access to clean water ... Proposed operations of the Colorado River Basin can directly impact water sustainability for Navajo communities. The Navajo Nation needs to be included as a full participant in all discussions that affect the Navajo Nation’s water."

Navajo President Jonathan Nez

As the author Wallace Stegner once wrote, “One cannot be pessimistic about the West. This is the native home of hope.”

DIRECTOR/PRODUCER/WRITER

Bo Landin is a Swedish biologist with more than 40 years of experience as a science, natural history and environmental writer, producer and director for books, radio, television and film. Landin resides in Heber City, Utah.

In 1984 he set up/hosted the prime time environmental program for Swedish Television, setting a benchmark for environmental films on world television. Films from this period include Prix Italia Ecology Prize winner Arctic Tragedy, winner of the Grand Prix at the European Environmental Film Festival Cubatao - the Valley of Death. International productions (for broadcasters like Discovery Channel, National Geographic, BBC, WDR and ZDF/Germany, Arte, France 5 and others) include internationally award-winning films like Yellowstone - America’s Eden, Cheetahs - running for their lives (Genesis Award winner - Best cable documentary US 1998), Wolverine - the Last Phantom and Taiga - forests of frost and fire (Grand Prix winner European Wildlife Film Festival 1999), The Death of a Bison Bull (Grand Prix winner Eco Film 1999).

In 2005 Bo Landin directed his first dramatic feature film; Macbeth, set in a landscape of snow and ice, with actors performing Shakespeare in Saami language. The film was the Grand Prix winner at the 2006 European Minority Film Festival in Germany. His most recent feature documentary Toxic Puzzle – Hunt for the Hidden Killer, narrated by Harrison Ford, has been awarded at several festivals: Utah Film Festival Winner Best Feature Documentary, Sedona International Film Festival Audience Award Best Impact Film, Vero Beach Film Festival Best Feature Documentary, Impact Docs Awards Award of Excellence, Green Earth Film Festival Award for Environmental Excellence.

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY

Matt Arkins is an nternational, award-winning filmmaker, director, cinematographer, and photographer, recognized industrywide for 20+ years of expertise in commercial production, television, feature films, motion picture films, music videos, and documentaries.

Produced and filmed the first ever full-length documentary on the elusive wolverine for the Discovery Channel and aired in 80+ countries.

Directed 300+ commercials for the U.S. Department of Defense’s American Forces Network, some of which now resides in the U.S. National Archives.

Managed $1M+ film budgets on multiple commercials; directed dozens of commercials for numerous advertising agencies, earning 15+ American Advertising Awards (ADDY®) for the productions.

Chosen to direct Coca Cola’s polar bear awareness commercials, filming polar bears in the tundra.

Recruited by Dean Semler, the renowned Oscar-winning Director of Photography for Dances with Wolves, as head of a unit to shoot footage for The Patriot.

Filmed, photographed, and documented cultures worldwide, including locations in the Amazon, Africa, the Galapagos Archipelago, the Arctic, Haiti, Southeast Asia, and Europe.

Initiated Roadwork, a current production, featuring photographer Tom Wright who dedicated his life’s work to documenting bands including The Who, The Rolling Stones, and The Eagles, and built the world’s largest multimedia collection of the British Invasion era.

COMPOSER

Alan Williams is an award-winning composer and conductor with more than 100 motion picture and television credits. Alan’s scores include the Academy Award nominated IMAX film, Amazon, Sony Pictures Classics’ Mark Twain’s America, and some of the highest rated movies made for television. Some of his recent credits include the Chinese theatrical feature film Legend of the Forest and the IMAX films Secrets of the Sea and Serengeti. Alan composed the award-winning score to the animated feature film, The Princess and the Pea and co-wrote the original songs with award-winning Lyricist David Pomeranz as well as the Student Academy Award winning short Pajama Gladiator. Alan has received 22 Global Music Awards. His score to 20th Century Fox’s Cowgirls n’ Angels won a Prestige Film Gold Award and Alan was awarded the Jerry Goldsmith Award for Best Documentary score for the Netflix series Moving Art: Underwater.

EDITOR

Mike Fox

Michael Fox is a speedy and talented film and television editor. Over the course of his 30 year career he’s had the opportunity to cut across every genre you can think of. From docs to music videos and pilots to features, Mike has a passion for storytelling. He has worked with the likes of Michael Bay (The Last Ship), JJ Abrams (Almost Human, 11.22.63), Stephen King (Mr. Mercedes), and Sir Anthony Hopkins (The World’s Fastest Indian) and is currently cutting for Showtime’s “King Shaka” helmed by Antione Fuqua. Mike is a well known and highly respected member of the film and television industry in both Utah and Hollywood, and brings a wealth of experience and gravitas to any project that finds its way into his Avid. Mike Fox has edited several of the internationally award-winning documentaries produced and directed by Bo Landin.

VOICE OF THE RIVER

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NARRATOR

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THE RIVER

The background story

Sitting at Dead Horse Point near the Canyonlands National Park, a majestic landscape stretching to the horizon in every direction, I still cannot fathom how it once looked here. What I see now is an earthly plain, presented as a moonscape: deserted, barren, with uneven crater edges and deep grooves. Only the lifegiving water brings me back to Earth. Far below my feet, 2,000 feet down into the mountain, the Colorado River meanders, and the river’s persistent force digs it ever deeper into the groove it tries so hard to escape. The river flows to a dis-tant ocean to the southwest, far from our line of vision. The dug-out canyon valley, just as majestic and grand as the one further south that won the name, feels ancient. But the ri-ver has only carved out a small portion of the age required to be a geological elder. The whole canyon is a geological youngster, whose five million years only stir the surface of the underlying bedrock’s two thousand-millionyear-old foundation.

But the rock that now lets the river tickle its surface was once caressed by rolling waves. Time and again, the sea has risen to cover the land – from the south, west, or east. It is the force

of water that gives the dry desert landscape its character and appearance. It’s a paradox, but still a fact.

I could virtually drown in the ancient seas of history and their impressive geology. But the reality of the present pulls me from my geo-scientific slumber, where everything happens in slow motion. The terrifying scenario that wakes me is the enormous concrete wall that is the Hoover Dam. Its construction is certainly im-pressive, and its near century in existence has many stories to tell of difficult times in the post-Depression years of the early 1930s. It created many jobs and a vision of waterenabled expansion in the Southwest. It breathed optimism, a brighter future: water and power to the people!

Behind the dam, Lake Mead appeared. With each passing day, more of the land upstream was submerged. The people behind these projects were so impressed, that they soon suggested building yet another dam further upstream. Around 1960, the Glen Canyon Dam appeared, and the slaughter of the land was undeniable. Where the Colorado River previously mean-dered, Lake Powell grew. For geologist and explorer John Wesley Powell to give name to this devastating mons-trosity is not fair. Even though Powell and his team were the ones to first navigate a large part of the Colorado River in the 1870s, his stubborn conclusion was that this part of the United States was not to be developed. He felt that there was no way to make the desert land fertile, no matter how much water the Colorado River could bring. He claimed that potentially two percent of the land, nearest the river, would be arable. Powell predicted immense conflicts

it would make the moisture rise, create clouds, rain, and give way to a lush, green landscape. This theory has been disproved by subsequent knowledge, but at the time, his argument was enough to convince Congress to support every new development project in the dry regions of the American

sur-rounding water rights and land rights in the area – and he wasn’t even considering the rights of the indigenous populations of the land.

But the railway companies, which had quickly laid claim to land as the United States expanded westward, did not agree. Then, as now, science and reason had to take a step back as the god of greed promised to put money in people’s pockets. One of the theories raised against Powell was the idea that “rain follows the plow”. To be fair, it was brought forth by another scientist. Cyrus Thomas was an entomologist, an expert on insects. He was also a fervent and early debater in the new scientific field of climatology. Thomas was convinced that if one were to cultivate the “Wild West”, allowing crops to replace the dry soil of the Southwest,

Southwest. The reason this principle – and many others –were so easily adopted, was the concept of Manifest Destiny: that the pioneers of the new country had a God-given right and duty to spread into the west, deve-lop the land and create prosperity in what they called deserted lands. The wars with indigenous people who had already lived there for thousands of years were seen as an inevitable necessity.

John Wesley Powell, who went on to be director of the US Geological Survey, this now esteemed institution, voiced his objections: “I wish to make it clear to you, there is not sufficient water to irrigate all the lands which could be irrigated...I tell you, gentlemen, you are piling up a heritage of conflict!”

Powell passed in 1902 and would never see his worst fears

John Wesley Powell

realized. When the 1930s arrived with an international financial depression, the United States headed toward its first real ecolog-ical disaster. The worst drought in a thousand years hit the land, and the ground that had been inappropriately tilled and over-exploited dried out. There would be no rain to follow the plow. Instead, the top layer of soil blew away and lay bare all the sand and fine particles once deposit-ed by the ice ages’ ice rivers to form the base underneath middle America’s vast grass plains. Wind erosion swept across enormous areas, from Nebraska to the north to Texas in the south. More than 64 million hectares turned into useless and wind-bruised land. Three-and-a-half million people were forced to flee. They became climate refugees. This wasn’t the first time that large groups of people had to flee because of climate change and natural disaster, but this was less than 100 years ago, and it paints a frightening picture of what may lie ahead, following the climate changes of today.

In the wake of the international depression and this natural disaster, President Franklin D. Roo-sevelt drew up the New Deal, a political mani-festo to bring the Unites States back on its feet. The Colorado River was offered up as a sacrifi-cial lamb. Dams were built, canyons sacrificed.

The battle continues, and the battlefield today is not just the river but also neighboring areas. While the battle of the land continues, the water levels in the manmade lakes decrease. The Colo-rado River delivers less water. At first, it was thought that increased populations in the Southwest caused this decline. Cities like Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, Tuscon, Denver, Salt Lake City, and Albuquerque all depend on water from the Colorado River’s upper tributar-ies in

reservoirs were filled as late as the year 2000. Subsequent droughts have left water levels in the reservoirs at 46% capacity, even though the yearly precipitation has increased by over one percent. How does this add up? The answer is heat. Even if yearly precipitation is up, droughts have resulted in less snow falling in winter. This, the winter precipitation, is what is most important to the river. Meltwater in a cold spring is what adds water to the rivers. But with rising temperatures, evapo-ration increases, and because of the Southwest’s low humidity, the water rises straight into the air. The hotter it gets, the more water evapo-rates. For each increased degree, evaporation increases by nearly eight percent. Researchers call this a hot drought, and the system will make each following dry period even more severe. The tragedy in all of this is that analyses of average numbers in the last 30-year periods, these short-er periods of extreme drought don’t show up. It

Colorado. Add to this a city like Las Vegas; this entirely artificial city built in the middle of the desert only survives thanks to the manmade oasis behind the Hoover Dam.

It is beyond a doubt that water consumption matters, and the flow is already so strained that the mighty river never even reaches the ocean in Mexico. The river that carves the Grand Canyon is no more than a trickle by the sea. New research shows that the warm climate is the cause. The large water

reminds me of that vivid description of averages: if I have one hand on a hot stove and the other hand on a cold one, on average I should feel pretty good. And I don’t!

The long-term images scientists now are painting indicate that we will get less precipitation in the future, as temperatures rise. The odd snowy year will not affect the long-term trend. When I see the sharp, white line of lime deposits that reveal Lake Powell’s highest water mark, the problem is clear. The level has dropped 82 feet in just 18 years! The flow of water has already decreased by 20% in a hundred years and the government calculates that 1,5 billion cubic me-ters of water has “disappeared” in recent years due to climate change. That is enough water to supply ten million people with water during a year. Knowing there is some 40 million people relying on the Colorado River water in the southwestern states, the numbers stack up and pose a threat. If the current rate of warming continues, the loss could well be 50 percent by the end of this century. The seven states involved in the present battle for the river’s water depend on and turn to a document written and signed almost a hundred years ago. Back then, the water was divvied up, not as a percentage of

the flow but in actual numbers of gallons of wa-ter. The agreement, known as the Colorado Riv-er Compacts of 1926, also creates a pecking or-der of uses, with agriculture and domestic uses taking priority over power production. Navigation is last in line. Neither wildlife nor recreation are mentioned in the Compacts or accompany-ing commentary.

of water tribes were entitled to, except that it should be “sufficient … for irrigation purposes.”

Now every state demands to get its share of the water, despite the fact the flow is down 20 per-cent and the water stored in the large reservoirs is a fraction of what it once was.

There are 30 tribal nations within the Colorado River watershed and yet not one was included in the negotiations nor even consulted during the creation of the Compacts. The Compacts’ sole acknowledgment that the tribes even existed was a single sentence, which read: “Nothing in this Compacts shall be construed as affecting the obligations of the United States of America to Indian tribes.” And since the Compacts divvied up all of the water in the Colorado River Basin — and then some — between the seven states, tribal water rights would be counted against the respective states’ shares. That’s although tribes are sovereign entities with rights superior to state governments. The exclusion was far worse than a gross oversight; it was a blatant attack on tribal sovereignty. It also showed an egregious lack of foresight. Fourteen years before the Compacts was ratified, the Supreme Court’s ruling in Winters v. the United States established that when the federal government “reserved” land for a tribal nation, it also reserved rights to water. And the appropriation date for those wa-ter rights would be the date the reservation was established, whether the tribe put the water to “beneficial use” at that time. Winters did not quantify the amount

The water they divided between themselves in 1926 doesn’t exist today, and it probably didn’t even exist back then. They are quarrelling about a pipedream; the equation doesn’t hold. California, at the “end” of the river still has the right to 40% of its water. People in Colorado, Utah and Nevada must accept – reluctantly – that the water is flowing by them. This

fight – the disagreement – will linger at least until 2026 when the century-old Compact runs out and must be re-negotiated.

In August of 2021 the U.S. Bureau of Reclama-tion announced the first-ever federal water shortage declaration for the Colorado River Basin based on the results of its 24-month study projecting ongoing shortages from drought con-ditions. Overall, the bureau said, total system storage for the Colorado River is at 40 percent capacity, a decline of 49 percent from this point in 2020. The declaration demanded immediate water conservation efforts along the river: Arizona must cut its use by 21 percent, Nevada by seven percentand also Mexico at the terminal end of the river is forced to cut the use by five percent, which is almost an insult as they for year’s didn’t even see any water reach the ocean in their country.

The Colorado River can no longer meet the needs of the 40 million people and the $15 billion agriculture industry that depend on it. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation recently announced that Arizona, Nevada and Mexico would see deeper cuts to their water supply in 2023. The agency also is asking seven Western states to find a way to conserve more. The states have not even come close to meeting the goal. Major water users in California, which is by far the thirstiest of the seven states drawing water from the river, agreed last month to cut water withdrawals by about 400,000 acre-feet, a decision that will have major implications for the agriculture-heavy Imperial Valley as well as the Los Angeles metro area. Arizona has reduced its Colorado usage over the past two years in compliance with pre-existing drought restrictions from the feds. The four states that comprise the river’s “upper basin” — Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, and Wyoming — have not announced any concrete steps to cut their water usage.

It is important to note that I drought-stricken stated like Utah and Arizona some 80% of all the water used is for agriculture, and both these states – and especially Arizona – produce alfalfa/hay for diary markets in Saudi-Arabia and China. A desert country like Saudi-Arabia invests heavily in Arizona to get access to cheap water, accessing both the Colorado River water and ground water from ever deeper drilled wells.

In theory, the federal government can unilateral-ly cut water deliveries from the Colorado River’s two main reservoirs, Lake Powell and Lake Mead, which release more than two trillion gallons of water to farms and cities across the Southwest each year. In reality, this has never happened: Previous cuts have always been negotiated between the federal government and the seven states that use the river. In effect, the letter is a formal warning to the river states, telling them that if they fail to make the major cuts necessary to prevent the reservoirs from bottoming out, the feds won’t hesitate to unilaterally cut their water deliveries to do so.

Maybe we can learn from history – here, too. Despite this land being arid for so long, people have lived here. The most famous of them are the Anasazi, whose civilization stretches back to 1,500 B.C. In the 10th century, and a few hundred years after, they made their way into the area we today call “Four Corners,” where Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona meet. At the beginning, they lived in the open landscape, creating towns and roads. Around 1250, A.D., they began building their cliff dwellings along the rivers of the Colorado Plateau. In the shade of protruding rock, they built abodes of several levels as well as storage for the corn they grew. These seed storages were so effective in the dry climate that researchers to this day have found nearly intact ears of corn.

Even today, remote descendants of Anasazi fam-ilies live in the area. The Hopi and Zuni belong to the Pueblo People who live in the American Southwest today. Now they are victims of new climate changes, as well as a Western culture that has invaded their lands and runs on ruthless development – as if nature doesn’t have limits. It becomes even stranger when I think that the name Hopi comes from the name they them-selves have for their people: Hopituh Shi-nu-mu, the historical and philosophical meaning of which declares they are a peaceful and gentle people in complete balance with their surroundings and in harmony with all things, and where Maasaw, Caretaker of the Earth, and Mother Earth herself are the gods to which they pray.

In early November, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a case brought by the Navajo Nation that could have farreaching impacts on tribal water rights in the Colorado River Basin. In its suit, the Navajo Nation argues that the Department of Interior has a responsibility, grounded in treaty law, to protect future access to water from the Colorado River. Several states and water districts have filed petitions opposing the tribe, stating that the river is “already fully allocated.” No states have made plans to accommodate the drop in water availability. Meanwhile, tribal nations are legally entitled to between 3.2 and 3.8 million acre-feet of ground and surface water from the Colorado River system.

The case highlights a growing tension in the region: As water

levels fall and states face cuts amid a two-decade-long megadrought, tribes are working to ensure their water rights are fully recognized and accessible.

There are 30 federally recognized tribes in the river’s basin, and 12 of them, including Navajo Nation, still have at least some “unresolved” rights, meaning the extent of their rightful claims to water have yet to be agreed upon. About 30% of Navajo residents lack running water.

Ultimately, Indigenous nations in the Colorado River Basin could be serious power brokers in crucial water negotiations to come — but they face historical, legal and practical obstacles. The Navajo Nation, for example, has rights to almost 700,000 acre-feet of water annually across New Mexico and Utah, along with unresolved claims in Arizona. But, because of a lack of infrastructure, up to 40 percent of Navajo households don’t have running water. For the Navajo Nation and other tribes with allocations in the basin, building and improving infrastructure means providing citizens with access to a fundamental human right: water.

But tribal water use is taken out of state allocations, meaning the more water tribes get access to, the less states have. It also means that states have less incentive to work with tribal leaders or recognize pending water rights claims. This conflict is not new. It has been built into a century of policies that have excluded and divested from Indigenous nations.

THE COLORADO RIVER

The Colorado River is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and northern Mexico. The 1,450-mile-long (2,330 km) river drains an expansive, arid watershed that encompasses parts of seven U.S. states and two Mexican states. The name Colorado derives from the Spanish language for "colored reddish" due to its heavy silt load.

Known for its dramatic canyons, whitewater rap-ids, and eleven U.S. National Parks, the Colorado River and its tributaries are a vital source of water for 40 million people. An extensive system of dams, reservoirs, and aqueducts divert almost its entire flow for agricultural irrigation and urban water supply. Its large flow and steep gradi-ent are used to generate hydroelectricity, meeting peaking power demands in much of the Intermountain West. Intensive water consumption has dried up the lower 100 miles (160 km) of the river, which has rarely reached the sea since the 1960s.

Native Americans have inhabited the Colorado River basin for at least 8,000 years. Starting around 1 AD, large agriculture-based societies were established, but a combination of drought and poor land use practices led to their collapse in the 1300s. Their descendants include tribes such as the Puebloans, while others including the Navajo settled in the Colorado Basin after the 1000s. Even after most of the watershed became US territory in 1846, much of the river's course remained unknown. Several expeditions charted the Colorado in the mid-19th century—one of which, led by John Wesley Powell, was the first to run the rapids of the Grand Canyon. Large-scale settlement of the lower basin began in the mid- to late-1800s, with steamboats sailing from the Gulf of California to landings along the river that linked to wagon roads to the interior.

The Colorado begins at La Poudre Pass in the Never Summer Mountains in Rocky Mountain National Park, 10,184 ft (3,104 m) above sea level. For the first 250 miles (400 km) of its course, the Colorado carves its way through the mountainous

Western Slope, a sparsely populated region defined by the portion of the state west of the Continental Divide. As it flows southwest, it gains strength from many small tributaries, as well as larger ones including the Blue, Eagle and Roaring Fork rivers. Most of the upper river is a swift whitewater stream ranging from 200 to 500 feet (60 to 150 m) wide, the depth ranging from 6 to 30 feet (2 to 9 m), with a few notable exceptions, such as the Blackrocks reach where the river is nearly 100 feet (30 m) deep. In a few areas, such as the marshy Kawuneeche Valley near the headwa-ters and the Grand Valley, it exhibits braided characteristics.

From Grand Junction, the Colorado turns northwest before cutting southwest across the eponymous Colorado Plateau, a vast area of high desert centered at the Four Corners of the southwestern United States. Here, the climate becomes significantly drier than that in the Rocky Mountains, and the river becomes entrenched in progressively deeper gorges of bare rock. Farther downstream it receives the Dolores River and defines the southern border of Arches National Park, before passing Moab and flowing through "The Portal", where it exits the Moab Valley.

In Utah, the Colorado flows primarily through the "slickrock" country, which is characterized by its narrow canyons and unique "folds" created by the tilting of sedimentary rock layers along faults. This is one of the most inaccessible regions of the continental United States. Below the confluence with the Green River, its largest tributary, in Canyonlands National Park, the Colorado enters Cataract Canyon, named for its dangerous rapids, and then Glen Canyon, known for its arches and erosion-sculpted Navajo sand-stone formations. Here, the San Juan River, carrying runoff from the southern slope of Colorado's San Juan Mountains, joins the Colorado from the east. The Colorado then enters northern Arizona, where since the 1960s Glen Canyon Dam near Page has flooded the Glen Canyon reach of the river, forming Lake Pow-ell for hydroelectricity generation. Downstream, the river enters Marble Canyon, the beginning of the Grand Canyon. Below the confluence with the Little Colorado River, the river swings west into Granite Gorge, the most dramatic portion of the Grand Canyon, where the river cuts up to one mile (1.6 km) into the Colorado Plateau, exposing some of the oldest visible rocks on Earth, dating as long ago as 2 billion years.

At the lower end of Grand Canyon, the Colora-do widens into Lake Mead, the largest reservoir in the continental United States, formed by Hoover Dam on the border of Arizona and Nevada. Situated southeast of metropolitan Las Vegas, the dam is an integral component for management of the Colorado River, controlling floods and storing water for farms and cities in the lower Colorado River basin.

After leaving the confines of the Black Canyon, the river emerges from the Colorado Plateau into the Lower Colorado

River Valley (LCRV), a desert region dependent on irrigation agriculture and tourism and also home to several major Indian reservations. Before channelization of the Colorado in the 20th century, the lower river was subject to frequent course changes caused by seasonal flow variations. Joseph C. Ives, who surveyed the lower river in 1861, wrote that "the shifting of the channel, the banks, the islands, the bars is so continual and rapid that a detailed description, derived from the experiences of one trip, would be found incorrect, not only during the subsequent year, but perhaps in the course of a week, or even a day."

The LCRV is one of the most densely populated areas along the river, and there are numerous towns including Bullhead City, Arizona, Needles, California, and Lake Havasu City, Arizona. Here, several large diversions draw from the river, providing water for both local uses and distant regions including the Salt River Valley of Arizona and metropolitan Southern Califor-nia. The last major U.S. diversion is at Imperial Dam, where over 90 percent of the river's flow is moved into the Gila Gravity Canal and Yuma Area Project, and the much bigger All-American Canal to irrigate California's Imperial Valley, the most productive winter agricultural region in the United States.

Below Imperial Dam, only a small portion of the Colorado River makes it beyond Yuma, Arizona, and the confluence with the intermittent Gila River—which carries runoff from western New Mexico and most of Arizona–before defining about 24 miles (39 km) of the Mexico–United States border. At Morelos Dam, the entire re-maining flow of the Colorado is diverted to irri-gate the Mexicali Valley, among Mexico's most fertile agricultural lands. Below San Luis Río Colorado, the Colorado passes entirely into Mexico, defining the Baja California–Sonora border. Since 1960, the stretch of the Colorado between here and the Gulf of California has been dry or a trickle formed by irrigation return flows (see image to the right). The Hardy River provides most of the flow into the Colorado River Delta, a vast alluvial flood-plain covering about 3,000 square miles (7,800 km2) of northwestern Mexico. A large estuary is formed here before the Colorado empties into the Gulf about 75 miles (120 km) south of Yuma. Occasionally the International Boundary and Water Commission allows a springtime pulse flow to recharge the delta.

The Colorado is joined by over 25 significant tributaries, of which the Green River is the larg-est by both length and discharge. The Green River takes drainage from the Wind River Range of west-central Wyoming, from Utah's Uinta Mountains, and from the Rockies of northwestern Colorado. The Gila River is the second longest and drains a greater area than the Green, but has a significantly lower flow because of a more arid climate and larger diversions for irrigation and cities. Both the Gunnison and San Juan rivers, which derive most of their water from Rocky Mountains snowmelt, contribute more water than the Gila contributed naturally.

About 72 percent of the Colorado River Basin is classified as arid, with the Sonoran and Mojave deserts covering the southern portion and the Colorado Plateau encompassing much of the central portion. About 23 percent of the basin is forest, with the largest area in the Rocky Mountains. These high plateaus and escarpments, often exceeding 9,000 feet (2,700 m) in elevation, form the northern and southern edges of the Colorado Plateau geological province. Developed land use in the basin is mostly irrigated agriculture, chiefly in the Grand Valley, the Lower Colorado River Valley, and the Salt River Valley, but the total area of crop and pasture land is only 2–3 percent of the entire basin. Urban areas cover less than 1 percent.

(Facts From Wikipedia)

WILL THE COLORADO BE THE NEXT RIVER TO BE GRANTED LEGAL STATUS?

It has been said that when we see rivers as living beings that are part of our community then that does actually profoundly change the way we speak about them, the way we make laws about them, the way we make decisions about them. In a first-in-the-nation lawsuit filed in federal court, the Colorado River is asking for judicial recognition of itself as a “person,” with rights of its own to exist and flourish.

The lawsuit, filed against the Governor of Colorado, seeks a recognition that the State of Colorado can be held liable for violating those rights held by the River.

Representatives of the lawsuit claim that “current environmental law is simply incapable of stopping the widescale environmental destruction that we’re experiencing. Our judicial system recognizes corporations as “persons,” so why shouldn’t it recognize the natural systems upon which we all depend as having rights as well? I believe that future generations will look back at this lawsuit as the first wave of a series of efforts to free nature and our communities from a system of law which currently guaran-tees their destruction.”

While this is the first action brought in the United States which seeks such recognition for an ecosystem, such actions and laws are becoming more common in other countries. In 2008, the country of Ecuador adopted the world’s first national constitution which recognized rights for ecosystems and nature; over three dozen U.S. municipalities, including the City of Pittsburgh, have adopted similar laws; and courts in India and Colombia have recently recognized that rivers, glaciers, and other ecosystems may be treated as “persons” under those legal systems.

In March 2017, the Whanganui River in Aotearoa New Zealand was the first river to officially be granted the status of a legal person. This declaration was the result of a legal battle, ongoing for more than 150 years, between the Whanganui Iwi (a Māori tribe) and the New Zealand Government. This legal personhood is based on the ontological understanding of the river as an indivisible and living whole and as the spiritual ancestor of the Whanganui Iwi. Under the 2017 law, Te Awa Tupua was recognized as an “indivisible and living whole, comprising the Whanganui River from the mountains to the sea, incorporating all its physical and metaphysical elements.”

In the USA several resolutions passed by Native Americans, including a Nez Perce General Council resolution recognizing the rights of the Snake River to exist, flourish, evolve, flow and regenerate. And a Yurok Tribe resolution recognizing the rights of the Klamath River to exist, flourish, and naturally evolve free from pollutants and contamination. Four dams in the Klamath River will now be demolished to let the river flow freely.

In Colorado the Ridgway town council has voted to give “rights of nature” to the Uncompahgre River that flows on the edge of its downtown, joining Nederland and a long list of international locations saying they want to be better stewards of their wild spaces.

Image: The confluence of the Colorado River and the Green River in Canyonlands National Park. Photo Tom Till

It:

world

Declares that ALL RIVERS ARE ENTITLED TO THE FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS set forth in this Declaration, which arise from their very existence on our shared planet Further declares that all rivers are LIVING ENTITIES that possess legal standing in a court of law

CONCERNED that excessive waterway diversions and groundwater withdrawals have sig-nificantly reduced flows in rivers worldwide, with many waterways now running completely dry, despite scientific consensus that adequate flows are fundamental to the survival of river ecosystems and serve as the lifeblood of many river-dependent freshwater and riparian ecosystems,

FURTHER concerned that humans have caused widescale physical changes to rivers through dams and other infrastructure, which includes the construction of over 57,000 large dams worldwide that impact over two-thirds of all rivers, resulting in fragmented habitats, reduced biodiversity, im-periled fish populations, exacerbated climate change, and retained sediment and nutrients that are fundamental to downstream ecosystem health, FINDING that national and international laws pertaining to waterways are vastly inade-quate to protect the integral health of rivers and river basins alike, and that these laws also fail to en-sure current and future generations of humans and other species as well as ecosystems with ade-quate supplies of clean water to meet their basic needs,

AWARE that all people, including indigenous communities and other local communities of all spir-itual faiths, have long held through their traditions, religions, customs, and laws that nature (often called “Mother Earth”) is a rights-bearing entity, and that rivers in particular are sacred entities possessing their own fundamental rights, COGNIZANT that the degradation and exploitation of rivers is not only an environmental issue, but also a rights concern for indigenous peoples and other local communities, as the destruc-tion of rivers threatens the very existence and way of life of those who rely upon river systems for their well-being.

People around the

point at the universal declaration on the rights of rivers.

THE RIVER

A documentary film project

Technical notes, budget assumptions and planned release

Budget (as of January 2, 2023)

Filming in 4k with a digital DCP version for theatrical release Sound in 5.1 Dolby surround

Estimated library footage: 15 minutes of historical and other footage

Filming on location: 16-20 weeks with a film crew of five Editing: 6 months

Post production and color: Studio 3, Los Angeles Narration: 2 narrators working 1-2 days each Music: original composition, studio in CA, orchestra recording in Bratislava

Social media: production will have a multi-year follow-up on social media cites, dedicated web site and social media accounts. The film will support important water conservation projects along the river.

The film budget includes costs for a carbon offset Profits from this film will be given as grants to various water projects along the Colorado River, in co-operation with suitable organizations

Release date: Q2 2024 world premiere at an international film festival with dates that coincide with planned release date. A sneak premiere along the Colorado River is also planned, followed by local screenings along the river. Theatrical release after festival schedule, to be decided.

The producers will seek theatrical and streaming partnership with suitable studio/platform company.

THE RIVER

Let our voices be heard

Days Location: 120

Director/producer: Bo Landin

Director of photography: Matt Arkins Editing: September 2023 - February 2024 Editor: Mike Fox

Photo: April - December 2023

Acct#

Category Description

Page Total

1000 Story and Rights 1 $22,000

1100 Producers 1 $126,000

1200 Directors 1 $368,250 1300 Cast 1 $40,000

1400 Above-The-Line Travel/Other 2 $38,640

Total Above-The-Line $594,890

1500 Production Staff 3 $30,000

2500 Set Lighting 3 $2,000

2600 Camera 3 $276,000

2700 Production Sound 3 $84,300

2800 Locations 4 $10,000

2900 Transportation 4 $40,600

3100 Video 4 $35,000 3200 Facilities 5 $30,000

Total Production $507,900

3400 Editing 6 $136,400 3500 Music 6 $200,000 3600 Post Production Sound 6 $61,200 3700 Post Production Film & Lab 6 $115,000 3800 Titles & Opticals 7 $7,000

Total Post Production $519,600

3900 Insurance 8 $14,000 4000 Publicity 8 $40,000

4200 General Expense 8 $366,758

Total Other $420,758

Total Above-The-Line $594,890

Total Below-The-Line $1,448,258

Total Above and Below-The-Line $2,043,148

Total Fringes $0

Grand Total $2,043,148

Production: Scandinature Films USA Inc.

HEBER CITY, Utah