The Dream Stream is the result of an extraordinary personal project. Thomas Öhman is a professional cameraman and very experienced fly fisher. There are obvious ways to combine those skills. Öhman decided to take a tougher, more personal route: no film crew, no fellow anglers, no guides (for that matter no hotel or lodge), no motor vehicles. Öhman loaded a canoe with his video camera, fishing and camping gear and just about enough food for four weeks and headed off into the far reaches of northern Sweden.

The idea was to make a film of that trip, the journey, places and of course the fishing. It turned out to be a lot more complicated than it first sounded so Öhman spent one month every summer for seven years fishing, filming and working on his project, searching for his ‘midge-fishing paradise’. (Don’t expect that to mean ‘midge’ the insect, it means ultra-light-line fly rods.)

Considering Öhman’s background I expected a well-made video and I wasn’t disappointed: good sound and image quality, some simply beautiful scenes, and the whole thing is well edited. This is an unpretentious and very watchable video, with no weighty pseudo-philosophising; just a guy out in the wilds, fishing, travelling, camping and fishing a bit more.

I found myself engaged by his project. Öhman talks to the camera about what he’s doing, that he’s filming himself, that he’s learning how cope with a canoe, while the film unfolds. As a viewer that adds an unusual layer. Meanwhile those seven years are brought together, so what I see seems like a single fishing trip with Öhman seeking one of those special fishing places or moments. I’m shown flies and fish, wildlife, stunning places and scenes, but the way this has been constructed, with Öhman’s talking about what he’s doing and how he’s doing it, means I’m reminded I’m not there. I’m being allowed to see a little of what he experienced, not at all the same as being there and heaving that canoe around or fishing those pristine streams or being alone on those rivers and lakes for seven months. His satisfaction when he ultimately lands a trophy trout on a one-weight is his, that private satisfaction we may all know from fishing, which comes from all of the adventure not just the big one. Tantalising! Well worth watching!