NEVADA CITY, CA. (Dec. 15, 2022) – The South Yuba Rivers Citizens League’s (SRYCL) Wild & Scenic Film Festival has unveiled its full 2023 lineup of over 100 environmental and adventure films to be shown at its 21st annual event from February 16th to February 20th, 2023.
The full lineup of films along with the schedule of programming is now available to review and reserve at WSFF.Eventive.Org.
After two years of virtual festing, the Wild & Scenic Film Festival returns as an in-person event featuring many mainstay elements of the past, including the fun 3D film session on Thursday evening and the beloved Saturday Morning Kid’s Films session. One of the nation’s largest environmental and adventure film festivals, attendees will enjoy a wide variety of award-winning films about nature, activism, and adventure. The 2023 edition will feature a program including 23 features and 105 short films, continuing to bring together top filmmakers, activists, and social innovators to inspire environmental awareness and action.
Festival workshops will include a special panel brought together by Earthjustice that will explore the issue of lithium mining, its impact on the environment as well as indigenous populations, and the conflict inherent in mining our way towards a green future. Stay tuned for a full list of non-film programming to be announced soon.
“After two years of gathering virtually amidst somewhat divisive times, the WSFF team greatly anticipates returning to in-person festivities and uniting our community around this beloved event and the many incredible stories and lessons it provides,” said WSFF Director Lívia Campos de Menezes. “With our 2023 theme of CommUNITY, we reflect on the significance of grassroots movements, the importance of working as a unified community, and the power of film to inspire activism and promote social and environmental changes.”
New, current, and renewing SYRCL members receive a discount on passes for the festival in addition to free access to a library of more than 1,000 films featured in past festivals. To find out more about becoming a SYRCL member, visit the SYRCL website at yubariver.org.
To learn more about the full lineup of films slated for screening and to purchase passes or tickets, visit WSFF.eventive.org.
Some of the marquee films presented at the 21st Annual Wild & Scenic Film Festival include:
Devil Put the Coal in the Ground – Uniquely structured upon the personal storytelling of native West Virginians, the film is a meditation on the suffering and devastation brought on by the coal industry and its decline. From the realities of a crumbling economy to the ravages of the opioid epidemic, to the irreparable environmental damage and its tragic impact on human health – the film is a cautionary tale of unfettered corporate power and an elegy to a vanishing Appalachia.
Exposure – Against all odds and polar advice, a Muslim chaplain, a French biologist, a Qatari princess, and eight other women from the Arab World and the West attempt to ski across the melting Arctic Sea ice to the North Pole. During what could be the last-ever expedition over the disappearing ice cap, director Holly Morris and her crew capture this audacious team of underdogs as they navigate everything from frostbite and polar bear threats to sexism and self-doubt in an intimate story of resilience, survival, and global citizenry.
From Light and Dust – What is light? When you wake up every morning, open your curtains, and see that the day’s light has come again, it’s no big deal. For nature, however, it’s an important clue in controlling biological and physiological changes in life forms. Light controls plants’ growth and flowering hormones; it’s also linked to people’s emotions, often causing irritability for no apparent reason. Other times it’s about the oversaturation of light and the dissonant, artificial light ubiquitous in modern life. Shot from a photographer’s point of view, the film intuitively seeks good light while also examining light’s existence from agricultural and cosmic perspectives.
Hasta la última Gota – the film follows the fight of those working to change a national charter that has privatized Chile’s vast natural water supply. Following an uprising in 2019 that drew millions of protestors across the country, and against the background of a 15-year drought that has left over half of the country in an official water emergency, a popularly elected body has been tasked with rewriting the constitution from scratch.
Stewart Udall: The Politics of Beauty – the film introduces us to the birth pangs of modern environmental politics, to figures like Leopold, Rachel Carson, David Brower, and John Saylor. See how Stewart Udall’s ideas evolved, best illustrated in his conversion from a pro-power dam Arizona representative to the Interior Secretary who dealt the death blow to proposed Grand Canyon dams. It also examines his long fight to win compensation for Navajo people and “downwinders” who got cancer from their exposure to radiation during the Cold War without being warned of the dangers. And we see the relevance of his concerns—he was the first public official to speak out about global warming, for example—to our current day crises.
Range Rider – As wolves repopulate Washington State, conflict is heating up with rural, ranching communities. As a range rider, Daniel Curry is dedicated to reducing predation by creating a buffer between wolves and cattle that roam on public lands. As poaching and state sponsored culls take their toll, can Daniel prove that coexistence between ranchers and wolves is possible?
Secrets of the Sea – experience in 3D the fascinating ways marine animals depend on each other for survival, and the importance of biodiversity to keeping our oceans healthy.
