WILD AND SCENIC FILM FESTIVAL

Wild & Scenic Film Festival

Visits Hoboken April 24 and 25

Main Street Pops joins with local restaurants to take ‘dinner and a movie’ to new places.

The California-based Wild & Scenic Film Festival (WSFF)—which captures the dramatic beauty of Mother Nature to celebrate her and inspire environmental activism—is coming to Hoboken April 24 and 25, as part of the festival’s 2021 national tour. Th is is the 19th year for the WSFF, and the second year that Main Street Pops, a women-owned pop-up programming company, has brought the festival to Hoboken— and they’re ready. Th ey’ve distilled the multi-day festival into a curated weekend of breathtaking viewing (a Saturday evening event for general audiences, and a Sunday midday event for families) that can be watched streaming or within a 24-hour time frame as video on demand. Viewers in Hoboken and Jersey City can enhance the experience with dinner and/or brunch, prepared and delivered to their door by local restaurants Salt + Seed and Seven Valleys Persian Cuisine. Main Street Pops was ready last year too, when it was all set to host WSFF for the fi rst time. But it wasn’t ready for COVID-19, which shut down live events everywhere— including WSFF in Hoboken—practically overnight. But Shan Gettens says she and fellow Main Street Pops co-founders Tracy Gavant and Zabrina Stoff el found a way to make the festival happen by taking it virtual. Even more important, they stayed true to the giving spirit of the festival, which is what caused them to bring it to Hoboken to begin with. Th ey turned the 2020 event into a fundraising fi lm series, raising more than $20,000 for local organizations in need during the COVID-19 pandemic. “When we fi rst screened some of the short fi lms WSFF featured last year, the three of us found ourselves both inspired and moved to tears. We just knew our community would respond the same way,” Gettens says. “We live in Hoboken and want to invest in it. Main Street Pops truly cares about community, and pop-up events we have produced are designed to make an impact. Th e Wild & Scenic Film Festival fi t that mold perfectly.” As life is getting closer to normal, so is this year’s WSFF, which through great fi lm and food is delivering on Main Street Pops’s mission: to support local arts, create a stronger sense of community, off er access to diverse voices and perspectives, and promote sustainable and responsible living. To learn more about each fi lm go to WildAndScenicFilmFestival.org. For ticket prices and more information, visit MainSreetPops.com/wild-scenic-fi lm-festivalon-tour-2021/ or see our calendar on page 32.

Wild & Scenic Sponsors Main Street Pops brings the Wild & Scenic Film Festival to Hoboken with the support of the following local businesses:

Saturday, April 24, 8 p.m.

INSPIRING ADVENTURE (General Audiences)

River Looters (4 mins) Th ree river surfers turned obsessed free divers hunt for lost belongings in Oregon’s Deschutes River.

Th e Crown (4 mins) Th ru-hiker, veteran and Merrell ambassador Will “Akuna” Robinson completes the Triple Crown of Hiking: the Appalachian Trail, the Pacifi c Crest Trail and the Continental Divide Trail.

Pathfi nder: Life Beyond Fear (10 mins) Follow six world-class slackliners on a highlining mission deep into the Norwegian mountains to attempt something that has never been seen before: walking a thin line, elevated in the vastness between two colossal cliff s, illuminated only by the northern lights.

Pedal Th rough (14 mins) Director Analise Cleopatra had never camped or ridden a bike off the pavement when she decided to plan a weeklong mountain-biking adventure through the Oregon backcountry with an all-black female team.

Water Flows Together (11 mins) One of the few female Diné (Navajo) guides on the San Juan River narrates this meditation on the challenges she and her community have faced, her kinship with the river, and her quest to create positive change.

Dani Burt (11 mins) Follow Dani, who lost part of her leg due to injury, as she seeks to become the fi rst-ever women’s World Adaptive Surfi ng champion.

Made in Voyage (25 mins) Cody and Kellyn put their lives on hold to embark on an adventure far removed from the responsibilities, social engagements and smartwatches of fast-paced 21st century life. Flotsam (10 mins) A small, gritty band of kayak fi shermen forsake fl ashy boats for utilitarian pieces of plastic to pursue their passion, paddling miles out to sea for exhaustive encounters with prehistoric sport fi sh.

Myrtle Simpson: A Life on Ice (34 mins) At age 90, nearly 55 years aft er she was the fi rst woman to cross Greenland’s polar ice cap, Myrtle Simpson—trailblazer, skiing pioneer, adventurer, writer, mother and polar explorer—is still going.

Sunday, April 25, Noon

WILD CHILD (Family Program)

30° Below (3 mins) Follow an Alaskan musher and his sled dogs in the barren, harsh and beautiful landscapes near Fairbanks, Alaska.

Beebox (2 mins) Th is is a story of contemporary agriculture and a need for change, as told by a bee and its box.

If We Take Care of the Land and Water, It

Takes Care of Us (4 mins) A young girl from San Luis, one of Colorado’s oldest towns, explains how it keeps up its historic tradition of equitable distribution of water.

Life of a Plastic Cup (4 mins) Follow the adventures of a small plastic cup that, aft er being used just once at a party, is carelessly discarded, resulting in a trip to the ocean.

Camel Finds Water (9 mins) Narrated, styled and scored like a fable, this is the yarn of surfer Trevor Gordon, who pursues the quirky dream of restoring a wrecked boat and putting it out to sea off the coast of British Columbia.

Baked Fish: Peix al forn (4 mins) What happens if there is so much plastic waste fl oating in the oceans that the fi sh disappear? Check out dinner options for 1, 2 & 4 people with our dining partners for home viewing when purchasing tickets at: MainStreetPops.com/wild-scenic-fi lmfestival-on-tour-2021/

Stories from the Blue: Ocean Guardians (7 mins) Th e National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Ocean Guardian School Program provides opportunities for kids to get out in their environment to do hands-on projects.

Disappearing Penguins (15 mins) A team of scientists travels to Elephant Island, a remote island off the Antarctic peninsula, to fi nd out how its penguin population is faring.

Strike With Us (2 mins) Meet 9-year-old Hawkeye Huey, who’s been hearing a lot about climate change and the climate crisis—and it’s freaking him out.

Becoming Ruby (19 mins) If you can’t fi nd a hero, create your own. For mountain biker, skier and artist Brooklyn Bell, that hand-drawn hero is a comic character named Ruby J.

It’s Me, Landon (4 mins) Eight-year-old Landon Moise shows us around his favorite forested spots in his home community, Clearwater River Dene Nation.

24 Leeches (10 mins) A tribute to a father’s best friend and adventure partner, his 10-year-old son, 24 Leeches documents a family canoe adventure to the Slate Islands of Ontario.

FOOD and FILM

Salt + Seed: Elevated vegan comfort food SaltAndSeedEats.com

Seven Valleys : Traditional Persian cuisine SevenValleysRestaurant.com