May it run, in the heart of today’s Europe, an unexplored river 50 kms long? In Skocjan, in the modern Slovenia, a huge chasm plunges into the air. At the bottom flows a river, the Reka, that at some point leaves the surface to begin its long underground voyage. A trip of over 50 kms in the darkness that links Slovenia and Italy, running under the woods of Carso and the city of Trieste, until it flows into the Adriatic Sea with the name of Timavo. A route still unknown today, a geographic “gap”. The hidden river Reka-Timavo is a unique phenomenon in the world and a mystery still catching.
The dream is still the same: following the dark ways of water under the Carso, exploring the River of the Night. The story of an impossible challenge, of success and tragedy, where the main characters are the grottenarbeiter (cave workers) and, today, the speleologists. Yesterday the challenge was finding water for the thirsty Trieste, now finding an access to the mythical river.
The documentary moves freely between past and present reenacting some historical explorations and telling the actual challenge among different speleological teams, young and less young, begun some years ago. A challenge ending in November 2010: who will arrive first to lighten the River of the Night?