Documentary ‘A River Out of Time’ probes green economy projects in Indonesian Borneo

The film’s release on World Rainforest Day 2025 highlights Kayan River communities impacted in North Kalimantan.

Jun 22, 2025 - 05:00
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Documentary ‘A River Out of Time’ probes green economy projects in Indonesian Borneo

A documentary short from RFA-affiliated news service BenarNews explores concepts of the “green economy” in Indonesia’s North Kalimantan province.

Through conversations with people living along the river, environmental activists, and project developers, “A River Out of Time” focuses on some of Indonesia’s latest and most ambitious development projects: its still-under-construction capital city, Nusantara; a sprawling “green” industrial zone; and a cascade of five dams planned along the Kayan River.

Indonesia’s central government is also forging ahead with plans to construct five dams along three rivers in North Kalimantan province as part of Southeast Asia’s largest hydropower project. Scheduled for completion in 2035, the cost of the cascade is estimated at more than $20 billion and could yield a generation capacity of 9,000 megawatts.

“The sense of uncertainty shared by Kayan River communities depicted in the film mirrors that of countless others around the world in today’s era of climate change,” said BenarNews Managing Editor Kate Beddall. “‘A River Out of Time’ allows us to reflect on what we lose as we alter the natural world and our own place in it.”

“Every film I have worked on aims to paint a complete picture of a unique, personal experience. ‘A River Out of Time’ does the same,” said director Roger M. Richards, best known for Sarajevo Roses. “As our team traveled along the Kayan, we built an interactive, multimedia travelogue of our journey: an elegy for a once-wild, doomed river.”

The documentary short film is available in both English language and Bahasa Indonesia.

On April 3, BenarNews stopped updating its platforms following a decision by the U.S. administration to withhold its funding.

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