Route One/USA

Route One runs five thousand kilometres along the Atlantic coast, from the Canadian border to the tip of Florida, and is the first major highway in the United States. Doc, a physician who spent many years working in Africa, comes home and decides to reconnect with his own country by walking it. The documentary uses the journey as a frame and looks mainly at the people met along the way. That Doc is someone returning from outside also sets the film’s view; everything he sees is at once familiar and strange to him. The two hundred and fifty five minute running time is used to keep the walk unhurried. Well known figures of the time such as Jesse Jackson and Pat Robertson appear in the film. Paul McIsaac plays Doc. Robert Kramer’s documentary, a joint production of France, Italy and Britain, was completed in 1989.