ShAFF 2021: Spirit of Adventure Films 2

From My Window 20 minutes

From her bedroom window, Melissa Simpson looks out at the highest peaks in Colorado. Despite being so close, the mountains have always been worlds away for Melissa, who was born with cerebral palsy. With the help of her friend and mentor, blind adventurer Erik Weihenmayer, Melissa sets out to conquer something far greater than a summit. Through humility and grace, Melissa proves that what is within us, is stronger than what's in our way. One of the things we enjoy most about documentary filmmaking is the opportunity to peak behind the curtain and be invited into peoples lives that you wouldn’t otherwise get to meet. It’s one of the great gifts of the craft. You get to go interesting places and learn so much about people and the challenges and struggles they face. And sometimes, like with Melissa, you get to celebrate in the victories. It’s a real honor to be trusted with the task of bringing stories like Melissa to the world.

Project Wild Women 23 minutes

The filmmaker, 26, born and raised in a small village, wanted to escape the stifling surroundings of her orthodox family. She thought to herself if she is the only one fighting to keep her passion for sports alive or are there other girls like her. With many questions in her mind, she went on a journey across India to find women like her and start a dialogue with them. During the journey, she found 13 women practising 11 different extreme and alternative sports. The film explores her conversations with these women and gives us a glimpse into their life of practising extreme and alternative sports, and what drives these women in a country such as India where women pursuing extreme sports are still looked down upon.

The Mystery Of Now 17 minutes

In the short film, “The Mystery of Now,” artist and Apache Skateboards founder, Douglas Miles shares socio-political context around the history that lead to life on the San Carlos Apache reservation, and the personal history of how and why he started a skateboard brand and team of local youth leaders. His advice on cultivating resilience, creativity, and joy, provides guidance in a time that for many feels uncertain, polarizing and divisive in our living rooms and around our dinner tables. "It’s no mystery that the history of Native American people in this country has been overlooked, misrepresented and maligned to create a more heroic narrative for settlers to sell books, to sell land, and to sell movie tickets," Douglas shares. "In the middle of this cultural clash, stereotypes and battles for agency, one thing that has never ceased is Native creativity and the making of art. In our creativity we recreate ourselves, and in doing so we create and shape the world around us." In his words, "this film is visual meditation about life on the Apache nation via lived experience of Apache Skateboards. It’s a soulfully joyous glimpse into hard-edged lives of Native kids becoming artists, musicians, skaters, creatives, and leading in their community using art, music and skateboarding as a means of expression and power." "I felt if I could create art that kids could use it would change the way we not only looked at art but would change the way we looked at our community and ourselves," Douglas says. "This film captures the joyous, yet open-eyed worldview that living on the res develops in young people."

Family Routes 30 minutes

Leanne Robinson and Dwayne Wohlgemuth embarked on a summer-long canoe trip across the Northwest Territories with their two sons: four-year-old Emile, and one-year-old Aleksi. Together they face the challenges of living off the land and criticism back home.