This year’s edition of the Telluride MountainFilm Festival will feature two official selections highlighting iconic fish and another featuring angler and artist KC Badger.
Here are the three films.
Kamchatka Steelhead Project – Directed by Travis Rummel and Grayson Schaffer
Located between the Bering Sea and the Sea of Okhotsk, Russia’s remote Kamchatka Peninsula is home to some of the world’s most abundant steelhead runs. Under Russian law, the thick-bodied fish are protected as an endangered species, and it’s illegal to catch them — unless the fishing is done by anglers collecting biological data. The Kamchatka Steelhead Project is a U.S.-Russia partnership that monitors the steelhead population through catch and release, and over the course of 20 years it’s produced an extensive body of data about the fish in their wild and native habitat.
The Super Salmon – Directed by Ryan Peterson
Proponents of a plan to construct a $5.2-billion mega-dam on Alaska’s Susitna River say it wouldn’t affect the watershed’s famous salmon runs because the site would be 184 miles upstream from where fish usually swim. Tell that to Super Salmon, one particularly determined king salmon that swam more than 300 miles, dodging hungry seals from Cook Inlet to the Susitna’s icy headwaters. The Super Salmon highlights the tale of one fish to illustrate the importance of the river to the area’s wildlife, tourism, economy, and lifestyle. Told by passionate and animated Talkeetna fisherman and activist Mike Wood, the story examines the potential consequences of constructing an enormous and outdated technology to meet Alaska’s need for renewable energy.
Urban Circus Fish – Directed by Chris Kitchen and Sam Pope
“…When that fish comes up to eat, man you’re excited,” says KC Badger, a fly fisherman in Phoenix, Arizona — not exactly a mecca of the sport, but all the more reason Badger and his friend, Kenny Price, enjoy the fish of their labors. From carp to koi and bass to trout, Badger and Price travel through the metropolitan area in search of fish less caught. And when he’s not hauling fish out of canals, urban ponds and other unorthodox water sources, Badger is chasing his other urban passion: BMX biking.
