A dissatisfied housewife (Lisa Bowman) and her boozing lover (Larry Fessenden) are sent on the run together, thinking they've committed murder. They try to leave South Florida but lack the money to do so.
River of Grass is very funny, but in a more somber key it also test-drives what will become Reichardt's specialty: the transformation of cheerless wastelands into backdrops for journeys of the parched soul.
If Meek's Cutoff could be seen as an anti-Western, using the genre's tropes in defiantly subversive ways, River of Grass pulls similar tricks with crime drama and noir clichés.
[It] isn't able to reach the peaks of Reichardt's later monumental work, but it's educational in mapping out her concerns as a filmmaker, and a stirring reminder of her abilities as a visual stylist.
Reichardt subverts expectations at every turn, while simultaneously painting a vivid portrait of southern Florida (the title refers to the Everglades, and the film goes back and forth between Broward and Dade County) in all its sun-drenched seediness.
