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Shining Mountains Film Festival showcases Indigenous storytelling — from outdoor adventure movies to investigative documentaries

Hunkpapa Lakota skier Connor Ryan stands atop a mountain in the poster for “Spirit of the Peaks,” one of the documentaries screening at the 2024 Shining Mountains Film Festival. The film explores the relationship between Indigenous history and culture and the pursuit of outdoor adventure.
Courtesy of the Shining Mountains Film Festival
Hunkpapa Lakota skier Connor Ryan stands atop a mountain in the poster for “Spirit of the Peaks,” one of the documentaries screening at the 2024 Shining Mountains Film Festival. The film explores the relationship between Indigenous history and culture and the pursuit of outdoor adventure.

The annual Shining Mountains Film Festival will showcase nine films over three days at the Isis Theatre in Aspen this weekend.

The program is organized by the Aspen Indigenous Foundation, honoring both the joy of Native American culture and the trauma of a challenging history.

It kicks off Friday, with two outdoor adventure films. One of the selections, titled “Spirit of the Peaks,” puts the focus on Hunkpapa Lakota skier Connor Ryan, who evaluates his connection to the land as a Native American who often recreates in places that Indigenous people have been displaced.

“If I'm in the mountains, and these are the mountains that the Ute people were so uniquely adapted to be in relationship with, and they're not here now, then where are they?” Ryan reflects in an early scene from the 40-minute documentary. “Is there some energy of these people who've spent so long in this place that's wondering, what will you do for me? What will you do for my grandchildren? What will you do to carry on this legacy?”

Also on Friday’s lineup, the film “In the Dirt” will feature a group of Native American cyclists working to bring biking to the Navajo Nation.

Saturday’s matinee program spotlights half a dozen shorts, on topics that range from arts and culture to wildlife conservation. The lineup includes award-winning projects like “Joe Buffalo,” about an Indigenous skateboarder and survivor of Canada’s Indian Residential School system, “Brave Wear Braids,” about the tradition behind braided hair, and “Cara Romero: Following the Light,” about a contemporary fine art photographer and Chemehuevi citizen.

The program culminates on Sunday evening with a feature-length investigative documentary called “Sugarcane.”

Critics have called it a “gut-punch of a documentary,” “devastating,” and “deeply human.”

“Sugarcane” investigates “the forced separation, assimilation and abuse” that many Native American children endured at a residential school run by the Catholic Church in Canada, according to the film’s description; it also grapples with the aftermath.

“Why are they dying? Do they think we’d be stupid?” one subject wonders in an excerpt from the film’s trailer. “All of our lives, the rest of our lives, that we would never find out these things?”

It’s the debut feature from Julian Brave NoiseCat and Emily Kassie, who won a directing award for the project at Sundance earlier this year.

Tickets and more information are available at shiningmountainsfilm.com.

Kaya Williams is the Edlis Neeson Arts and Culture Reporter at Aspen Public Radio, covering the vibrant creative and cultural scene in Aspen and the Roaring Fork Valley. She studied journalism and history at Boston University, where she also worked for WBUR, WGBH, The Boston Globe and her beloved college newspaper, The Daily Free Press. Williams joins the team after a stint at The Aspen Times, where she reported on Snowmass Village, education, mental health, food, the ski industry, arts and culture and other general assignment stories.