Rivers and Tides: Andy Goldsworthy Working With Time

Critics Consensus

Andy Goldsworthy and his art are beautifully captured in this engaging documentary.

90%

Audience Score

User Ratings: 2,591

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Movie Info

Documentarian Thomas Riedelsheimer shows us Andy Goldsworthy as he creates art in natural settings using natural materials such as driftwood, ice, mud, leaves, and stones. Goldsworthy comments on his "earthworks" and occasionally responds to offscreen questions from Riedelsheimer while he painstakingly builds his outdoors sculptures. With some exceptions, such as a winding stone wall that he built in Mountainville, NY, Goldsworthy's creations are intentionally mutable works. We see how several of them fall apart, melt, or drift away due to exposure to the elements; we also see, for example, a complex structure of interconnected sticks collapse while Goldsworthy is still working on it. Riedelsheimer takes us to Goldsworthy's home in Penport, Scotland, and to a French museum, but the emphasis of the film is on observing Goldsworthy at work. ~ Todd Kristel, Rovi

Rating:

G
Genre:

Art House & International, Documentary, Musical & Performing Arts
Directed By:

Thomas Riedelsheimer
Written By:

Thomas Riedelsheimer
In Theaters:

Jan 1, 2002 wide
On Disc/Streaming:

Sep 28, 2004
Runtime:

90 minutes
Studio:

New Video

Cast

Andy Goldsworthy

Critic Reviews for Rivers and Tides: Andy Goldsworthy Working With Time

All Critics (71) | Top Critics (23) | Fresh (70) | Rotten (1)

Andy Goldworthy's work deserves to be profiled in this breathtaking, beautiful, and fascinating look in to nature, the creative process, and of an unassuming artist...

April 29, 2009 | Full Review…

Felix Vasquez Jr.
Cinema Crazed
Top Critic
If the film lets Goldsworthy overexplain what's happening, it also affords ample to time to languidly take in the imagery and let its beauty and simplicity speak for itself.

April 2, 2008 | Rating: 4/5 | Full Review…

Ken Hanke
Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)
Top Critic
Quote not available.

December 30, 2006 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…

Empire Magazine
Top Critic
Quote not available.

September 15, 2005 | Rating: 4/5

Nell Minow
Movie Mom
Top Critic
An absorbing portrait of a unique artist's professional and personal communion with nature.

August 26, 2005 | Rating: B+ | Full Review…

Nick Schager
Lessons of Darkness
Top Critic
His work reminds us of an artist's true focus: a meditative commitment to discovery, creativity, and the enhancement of God's own invention.

January 15, 2005 | Rating: A

Jeffrey Overstreet
Looking Closer
Top Critic
Rivers and Tides: Andy Goldsworthy Working with Time is an extraordinarily spiritually literate documentary about one of the world's greatest nature artists.

October 5, 2004 | Rating: 5/5 | Full Review…

Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat
Spirituality and Practice
Top Critic
A wondrous look at an artist and his work with lots of joyous surprises.

September 30, 2004 | Rating: A+

Mark Robison
Reno Gazette-Journal
Top Critic
Hypnotic.

April 16, 2004 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…

Bruce Kirkland
Jam! Movies
Top Critic
A beautiful, probing art documentary.

April 16, 2004 | Rating: 3.5/4

Liam Lacey
Globe and Mail
Top Critic
When it's at its most self-aware, Rivers and Tides precociously tweaks the pessimist's view of art as an exercise in futility.

December 19, 2003 | Rating: 3.5/5

Steve Schneider
Orlando Weekly
Top Critic
Most of Goldsworthy's work is impermanent, but Rivers and Tides captures, permanently, both the art and the artist, showing us a creative, productive life in the process of being well-lived.

December 19, 2003 | Rating: 4/5

Roger Moore
Orlando Sentinel
Top Critic

View All Critic Reviews (71)

Audience Reviews for Rivers and Tides: Andy Goldsworthy Working With Time

Mar 25, 2014

[font=Century Gothic][color=sienna]"Rivers and Tides" is an interesting, low-key documentary about Andy Goldsworthy, a Scottish sculptor who works in nature while using material that he finds. The documentary captures his working at home in rural Scotland and abroad in Nova Scotia, New York and France. Goldsworthy is not sure what his sculptures will turn out due to the very unpredictability of what he is working with. Some of them are designed to be carried away by the rivers and tides. Thus, he illustrates how nature is ephemeral. It's very different seeing artwork that is not permanent and hanging in a museum.(I was thinking about the temporary paintings that were created only for "The Mystery of Picasso.") Goldsworthy captures these temporary sculptures by photographing them. [/color][/font]

Walter M Super Reviewer
Jul 23, 2012

Another documentary about a kooky artist. This one manufactures art of nature and watches as nature washes it away. It's kind of like those little stick forts that you made as a kid that washed away eventually down the drain. This guy never stopped making those forts.

John B Super Reviewer
Apr 27, 2008

i became interested in this documentary because of the Fred Frith score- which is excellent. Goldsworthy's art is spectacular to behold, but i feel the documentary would have been better with less speaking- just letting the art speak for itself.

chase _ Super Reviewer