Fighting the tide: a Louisiana bayou couple’s 70 bittersweet years of marriage

‘This is memories… good memories…’

Joseph and Selina Gonzales are a testament to the greater New Orleans region’s perseverance, having spent 70 years together amid the rising tide just outside of the city’s levee system, weathering destructive storms and personal tragedy. A film from the New Orleans-based art collective and non-profit Court 13, The Boatman spends time with the couple as they reflect on seven decades of memories – some happy, many sad – and prepare for an upcoming 71st wedding-anniversary bash. With images and sounds steeped in a culture of boats, bayou music and shrimp boils, the director Zack Godshall’s wistful, humane portrait finds flashes of hope in the rise and fall of the tides.