It’s summertime on the Danube River, and teenager Dídac and his tight-knit family are enjoying the pastoral beauty on a bicycle trip together. Memories swirl in the river’s waters, as Dídac’s parents reminisce over their first trials with love in their youth. Dídac’s own curiosity around romance and desire begins to stir when he encounters a mysterious boy who seems to appear and disappear from the river’s waters. As the two boys circle into closer and closer orbit, the growing pains of young love begin to widen the emerging cracks between Dídac and his family.

The boundaries between the waking world and dreaming flow freely like the river itself in Jaume Claret Muxart’s sensuous and ethereal feature debut, where longing conjures the ghosts of past and future. Set against a sunny, verdant landscape shot on 16mm, “Strange River” explores the freedom of blossoming youth with remarkable tenderness.

The film had its world premiere at the Orizzonti section of the Venice International Film Festival.