Jimi Shlag

Set in an East Toronto neighborhood, THE RIVER YOU STEP IN is about a maverick social worker and the troubled people she tries to help, and engages with issues of domestic abuse, addiction, and racial prejudice.

A once accomplished sculptor, a former college art teacher, but now a lonely graveyard shift doorman, Abner Roth is sadly a mere shadow of his former self. Having lost the love of his life and haunted by the death of a woman in a terrible car accident a year ago, he is desolate and suicidal but amusingly so. Step in Zoe, a free spirited taxi driver with a large hart and persuasive disposition. Zoe's energy and outlook help Abner look at life anew and try to reconcile his conflicted past.

For 10 years, a journalist has avoided visiting her small hometown. When news spreads about a comatose man healing people from his home, she is sent to investigate.

On a typical day, this small town is very peaceful. Grandmothers tell stories of biblical monsters while gently slapping the listener with a shoe. The daily routine of sunset ball play is interrupted only by the call of fresh fried sausages, or, perhaps, by the beckoning of a colorful alcoholic beverage. But this day is not a typical one. This day, the sea does not bring the usual boat engine, fish scull or metal briefcase ashore. Instead, it delivers a woman and a doll. A group of Mexican hipsters beach bums come upon this woman and her doll. Louise -- who may or may not be a disgruntled hippie dropping out, or a failed Ponzi schemer seeking solace in the ocean -- responds to her new surroundings with a coma-like stare.