Fly-Fishing Lures are Beautiful, Will Make Fishermen of Us All
Fly-Fishing Lures are Beautiful, Will Make Fishermen of Us All
"Megan Boyd’s entire world was wrapped up in her delicate, devastating flies," begins the haunting trailer for "Kiss the Water.” In what’s probably the prettiest fly-fishing film to hit the silver screen since “A River Runs Through It," filmmaker Eric Steel chronicles the life of Boyd, a Scottish fly-fishing legend whose lures were downright gorgeous.
Boyd, who died in 2001 at age 86, was roundly considered an “eccentric,” but her fabled lures—meticulously-crafted, colorful works of art—earned her the prestigious British Empire Medal and the regard of fly-fishing connoisseurs everywhere. They dubbed her jewel-hued “flies” (as lures are known) “the Tiffanies of the 20th century.”
Boyd was hardly a fly-fishing aficionado, the trailer attests. She never fished a day in her life, and detested the fact that her flies were used to kill fish. But she continued making them, driven by a deeper purpose. Her flies, Steel told one reporter, “weren’t the most practical or effective, yet some were famed for luring the biggest salmon every single time. She always said she made the flies for the fishermen not for the fish. They were beautiful objects but also incredibly functional.”
It’s the rare documentary that gets us wanting to see the film and embracing the sport. “In every strand, in every fiber, there was a mystery. A fairy tale. A truth, waiting to be unraveled,” coos the narrator.
Well that sounds lovely. You can view the film online here or catch it at a handful of stateside screenings. And if a long day of standing in a river doesn’t appeal to you, there’s no shame in settling for a gorgeous documentary in the cool, air-conditioned calm of a theater.
[via Laughing Squid]
