While College Outdoors (CO) is mainly known for providing accessible outdoor trips for students, this spring, they branched out to host a unique film festival to show underrepresented stories in the outdoors and connect to more students. The No Man’s Land Film Festival (NMLFF) is shown around the country and features adventure stories about women and genderqueer people, bringing underrepresented voices to the film space. CO was able to be part of the festival and connect with even more community members through the fascinating films shown. The two-day event was a hit — it was able to raise money and inspire and enthrall viewers.
The NMLFF was founded in 2015 and is meant to “undefine femininity” in adventure, athletics, outdoor movements and filmmaking. They want their audience to feel inspired to change the world through collaboration and be empowered by representation. Every year, the festival has a flagship event in Denver and a tour during which select films are shown across the United States and Canada. The festival at Lewis & Clark is a part of this tour.
CO Director of Operations Kori Campbell and CO Operations Manager Taylor Feldmen were the main organizers of this event. They worked with LC and NMLFF to put on a show specifically tailored for the LC community. They were sent a list of films featuring women and genderqueer stories and picked out eight movies to show.
“I chose ones that had a range of diverse voices and a range of diverse subjects and stories and sports that we do at College Outdoors. I chose things that were skiing and rock climbing and backpacking,” Feldman said.
CO hosted the festival to attract more students to the organization and display diverse identities in the adventure space. CO is a space for everyone, regardless of identity or experience level. Hence, the festival served as a way for people to become more involved, especially since the raised funds went towards making CO trips more financially accessible. Campbell explained more about how the new scholarship system will work for this academic year.
“The new system is that every student that has need-based financial aid can go on a College Outdoors trip for half the price for the rest of the year. And that includes spring break trips and all the rest of our trips, which is really exciting,” Campbell said. “So anyone that has work-study or any Pell grants or subsidized loans gets to go on trips for half price.”
Feldman explained that many adventure film festivals only focus on white male stories, so she was excited to showcase different perspectives that a wide range of students could feel represented by.
“I think the majority of our participants and supporters of College Outdoors are women or genderqueer people. I think that it’s our film festival; it is for us and for everybody,” Feldman said.
Students were also essential in organizing the festival. The CO Roundtable is a student committee that helps make decisions for the organization. For the festival, they helped with voting on the films and gathering student volunteers to help during the event. Campbell elaborated on the importance of student volunteers.
“There’s at least a dozen students who helped volunteer for the event,” Campbell said. “(Students) get to volunteer their time to help with the fundraiser to then support scholarships.”
Feb. 26, the first night of the festival, was exclusively for students and had a cheaper admission price. It drew quite a crowd, filling the Council Chambers near-completely with excited viewers. The energy from organizers was infectious too — they seemed eager to present and watch the unique films.
While all the films featured women and genderqueer stories, many also explored stories about perspectives from other countries and people of color. The film “The Destiny of a Sherpa Woman” followed the life of Yangji Sherpa, one of the only female mountain guides in Nepal. The international focus and rich storytelling were not only educational but also explored the largely-underrepresented voices of women of mountaineering in Nepal. It was also inspiring as it displayed the challenges Sherpa faced and overcame to break into the space.
Elise Son ’27 appreciated the diversity of voices, too. While she was initially interested in the film festival due to its representation of women and genderqueer people in outdoor spaces, she also appreciated the way the festival highlighted people of color.
“I thought it was nice how they presented different narratives from all over. I thought it was very balanced in that way,” Son said. “But also paying accountability and recognizing the boundaries that women and people of color go through to get to these spaces and feel accepted in them.”
Another broad theme was about the hope and community that the outdoors can bring. The last film shown was “Forward” about Anjelica Avella, a plus-sized trekker who organizes hiking and camping trips for women as a way to connect with other women and stay healthy. The film highlighted the challenges in her life, including working multiple jobs and being a caretaker for her mom, making her commitment to the outdoors especially inspiring. Son was moved by how hard the people in the films worked to find a space outdoors.
“I think it was very inspiring and I think it will hopefully reach more people to make them feel that the outdoors is their kind of space,” Son said. “I think just knowing that the outdoors has so much to offer for your mind and your body and that if that is something that you want to do, you should be able to do that in the future. It can have a lot of benefits for you and it’s a great space for community.”
Students were especially enthralled by the music video “Won’t Give Up” by Pattie Gonia, a drag artist from Bend, Oregon who champions for queer and environmental movements. The film felt like an excellent portrayal of LC culture as it featured a glamorous queen singing in a picturesque-but-threatened landscape about how we must come together to save our planet.
The next night, Feb. 27, was open to the public and featured raffle tickets to win prizes of outdoor gear. That night was sold out, with mainly non-LC attendees coming to see the films and win prizes, which Campbell and Feldman were thrilled about.
This is the first time CO has hosted an event like this, but both Campbell and Feldman hope to continue it in the future. Not only did it help raise money for student scholarships, but it also served to help more students engage with CO.
“Anybody is welcome to come into College Outdoors, and all of our programs are for beginners; no experience is required for any of our trips,” Feldman said. “So, if people are too afraid to enter or sign up for a trip, maybe they can still be involved in College Outdoors by coming and watching a movie.”
While the festival may be over for this year, CO still has many trips planned for the rest of the semester that anyone can sign up for, including during spring break. As illustrated by the film festival, the outdoors are a space for everybody to connect, persevere and be happy.
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