FRB SPECIAL
2009 MountainFilm Festival Comes to Boulder
by Jeff Williams 6-13-09            

Presented by the Access Fund, MountainFilm in Telluride brought a handpicked selection of films to the Boulder Theater on Weds. June 10, 2009. Billing themselves as America’s leading independent documentary film festival. Mountainfilm’s mission is dedicated to educating and inspiring audiences about issues that matter, cultures worth exploring, environments worth preserving and conversations worth sustaining.

The theme of the films centered on the exploration of human character with the intention to create a dialogue with the spirit found in beings across the globe. This year’s showing featured a variety of films and was not completely focused on outdoor adventure or pursuits. From a look into the eyes of small town American Barbershop where the locals have been gathering for Bluegrass sessions for last fifty years to a look at what we carry in our pockets and how these items portray us, the show carried a message of how we come to an understanding of ourselves and define our life.

The films did showcase some outdoor adventures. These included the opening of Bridal Veil falls with the ascent of Erik Weihenmayer, a blind man, and Chad Jukes, an amputee. This film posed the challenges faced on both a personal level and in re-opening the falls to the public by the Trust for Public Lands after many setbacks. There was also a dreamy and graceful short ski film of skiing in deep powder after a 100 year storm in Japan. We also followed along with a blind downhill mountain biker, asking ourselves what we needed to feel as if we have really lived our lives. Perhaps the most exciting adventure highlight was the attempt of climbers to summit Mount Meru, a pillar considered to part of the ‘center of the universe’ by many in Eastern religions. We were able to follow along through the eyes of the athletes as they struggled through storms to reach areas never before attained, only to have to back down at the last pitch.

The Zero Emissions Tour

Each year a selection of films from the international film festival are taken on the road to reach audiences who otherwise wouldn’t have a chance to experience the festival. Those films display themes of adventure, mountaineering, remarkable personalities and important environmental and social messages. This year they have done something that carries their message in a completely new way – they have embarked on the ‘Zero Emissions Tour’. This tour uses a 100% unsupported bike tour to carry the films to the locations throughout the west. Drew Ludwig rode his bike with all the films from Telluride over five days to bring the show to Boulder. Beginning in Telluride, CO the route goes across Colorado, up to Wyoming, over to Utah and back to Telluride over two months. They plan is to average 50 miles a day and spend enough time in our host communities to actively raise awareness of their trip, their films and their sponsors.

Read more about MountainFilm and the ZeroEmissions Tour here. You can also view a series of the short films online on the mountainfilm.org site. View the MountainFilm Tour schedule here.

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