Mary Bruno spent her childhood along a toxic stretch of one of the most neglected waterways in America. Decades later, she returns to kayak the river of her youth and tell its story. AMERICAN RIVER follows Bruno and river guide Carl Alderson on a four-day, 80-mile adventure down New Jersey's Passaic River, from its pristine source in a wildlife refuge to its polluted mouth in Newark Bay. With breathtaking cinematography, the river's extraordinary history, geology, and ecology are revealed as the kayakers navigate challenges, travel through urban landscapes, and head toward the industrial center that poisoned the Passaic for the past 60 years.