The event, which features more than 55 films plus guest speakers and discussion panels, kicks off with a special screening of The Diplomat, filmmaker (and MountainFilm festival director) David Holbrooke’s portrait of his father, former U.S. Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, who helped broker the Dayton Peace Accords that ended the war in Bosnia in 1995.
The festival features a number of films that are garnering considerable buzz, namely Unbranded (see trailer below), which documents a young Texas horseman’s plan to prove the worth of wild horses and raise awareness about their plight by adopting, training and riding wild horses 3,000 miles from the Mexican border to Canada through some of the American West’s wildest terrain. Unbranded producer Dennis Aig is appearing at the screening and taking part in a Q&A session afterward as well as a meet-and-greet at the Opening Night Party at Piazza D’Angelo.
On Saturday night, Academy Award-winning director Louie Psihoyos (2008’s The Cove) will appear at a screening of his new film Racing Extinction and sit down for a Q&A. The festival concludes Sunday night with a screening of Meru, which chronicles three men’s attempt to ascend Meru (also known as Shark’s Fin), a formidably jagged peak in India (see trailer below).
Click here for the full festival schedule. Three-day festival passes are on sale now.
