The Crested Butte Film Festival will take place this September, celebrating its 15th anniversary in the valley, this year with a renewed focus on events in Gunnison — where it all began.
“Gunnison is where we first started showing films and we really feel that this should be a valley-wide film festival,” said Executive Director Scott Robson. “We love involving the Gunnison community and the university as well.”
This year Robson plans to open up CBFF one night earlier in order to add a special Gunnison-focused day to the festival. On Sept. 23 at the Western Colorado University movie theater in the University Center on campus, the festival will kick off with a showing of a highly anticipated and acclaimed feature-length documentary that was selected specifically for its relevance to the Gunnison Valley audience.
The film, “Lost Wolves of Yellowstone,” chronicles the journey of Mollie Beattie, a woman who served as the director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and originally spearheaded the wolf reintroduction program of Canadian wolves into Yellowstone. The screening, including a live, in-person appearance and Q&A with filmmakers will begin at 6:30 p.m.
“[In honor of the 15th anniversary] we are trying to circle back to our roots and highlight Colorado filmmakers,” Robson said. “We’re building quite the block of films from people around the state, so that will be special this year.”
The Sept. 23 film showing will be presented by Western University’s Film Program in conjunction with CBFF. The event will be co-hosted by Julian Rubinstein, Filmmaker and Journalist-in-Residence at Western, as well as professor James Napoli, who heads up the graduate Creative Writing program.
“We are thrilled to solidify a partnership with Crested Butte Film Festival, not only to bring more opportunities for our students to have professional opportunities but also to help be a part of the launch of the Mountaineer Cinema to bring more quality film programming to the Valley,” said Rubinstein.
“We are trying to double down with the collaborative aspect, both with the screenwriting and filmmaking programs at the university, and with the community,” Robson said.
CBFF will then continue its festivities Sept. 24-28 in Crested Butte. Along with 80 films over the course of five days, there will be many educational and interactive offerings included in the film festival.
“We run 12 different special events throughout the course of the festival where you can meet the filmmakers,” Robson said. “There are coffee talks with filmmakers and screenwriters each morning, there are panels to attend, Q&A’s after the showings, and other fun ways to really get to see and experience the [filmmaking] process. We are really about giving people those immersive experiences.”
In addition to the Colorado filmmaker block, the festival will present a selection of short and feature-length outdoor and adventure films shown, alongside documentaries and a range of other genres.
“[This year] we have some documentary-focused films that are really strong, compelling and dramatic — personal stories of tragedy and triumph,” Robson said.
The films that were selected were chosen out of 400 films submitted to the festival.
The CBFF is also teaming up with Western to launch a new podcast called “Screenplaying.” The podcast will be hosted by Napoli and will be similar to a book club, but for film review.
“The Crested Butte Film Festival team has welcomed with open arms a creative collaboration with Western. It has been my honor to host talk-backs and appear on panels at the festival in the past, and our work together now includes a podcast about our love of cinema,” said Napoli.
Each month, a different film will be announced and made available to watch. The subsequent podcast will be an opportunity for professors, filmmakers, students and lovers of film to have an academic discussion about the film. The podcast is meant to overlap the love of film with the technical side of filmmaking and is for anyone who loves film, not just students.
“Screenplaying” is being recorded now and should be available to the public in video and audio format around December of this year.
CBFF is still looking for community members and film lovers who would like to get involved with the festival. There are volunteer opportunities in a wide range of roles — from helping at the box office to guest relations for visiting filmmakers and more.
CBFF is open to the public. Tickets are on sale on the CBFF website as well as at the Crested Butte Farmer’s Market. Festival passes and tickets to individual events are available. For more information, or to buy tickets, visit cbfilmfest.org.
(Gia Wright can be contacted at gia@gunnisontimes.com.)
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