River Phoenix | RedGage

River Phoenix

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RIVER PHOENIX

Born: 23 August 1970

Died: 31 October 1993

20 years ago today, River was well started on a drug binge, like many before, indulged in and shared, off to another dark nightclub on the warm, eternal-Summer streets of grungy 90’s Hollywood.

I don’t know why these things happen.

Some new books media coverage is out, marking the 20 years:

Bob Forrest's being most compelling as he was friends with River and has very personal insight:
NY Post article about Bob Forrest's book and recounting River's last night.
The Daily Mail's haunting, painful recounting of his last night.
Gavin Edwards talks about RIver's eccentric, religious upbringing and talks of his last night as more of an accident: NPR host Rachel Martin talks with Gavin Edwards about his biography of River Phoenix, Last Night at the Viper Room.

I can’t really explain what River Phoenix means to me. All I know is that I tape recorded Stand By Me on cassette tape and would listen to the dialogue as I fell asleep, I had a white pillar candle that stood as my worship of him, that I thought his soul was connected to, that I would regularly cry over his beauty, his words, his kindness, his pure soul - that was literally stolen by drugs and snuffed out way, way too soon.

This reflection started largely because of this post, comparing River and Harry Styles. I saw it when I was in a work meeting -couldn’t react- and honestly, couldn’t breathe. The thought that we might go through this again never, never occurred to me.

The things I celebrate are the happier/ more sentimental moments of River’s career:

he made one teen heartthrob movie “A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon” which was so, so good (even though he Hated being seen as a heartthrob)
that if ‘shipping’ was around back then I TOTALLY would have shipped River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves (Keaver? Rianu?)
The Rianu movies are some of my favorites - My Own Private Idaho is a fucking masterpiece and I Love You To Death was the closest River got to a heisty-buddy flick.
Very little will mean as much to me as the conversations between Chris Chamber and Gordie Lachance (youtube above)
I will never get over the sound of his voice, how delicate, soft, yet powerful. Or his eyes, the sorrow and intensity and beauty of his eyes and the lifetimes of experience, thought, and sentiment behind them.

The campfire scene in My Own Private Idaho -scratch that- any/all campfire scenes involving River Phoenix, but especially that one.

There is no resolution and I suppose that's just the way with idol-worship - but his character, his pure soul, that was basically just put through all too much in those short 23 years, is what we miss and contemplate the most.

We still want to see him and celebrate him, that's the only heartening thing about this. River's unreleased last film "Dark Blood" was screened for the first time in Santa Monica last night.

I want to add pictures of my notebooks from high school where I plastered them with pictures of River... will have to add that later. So long sweet River, always in our hearts. x