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Montana Film Festival 2023

Arts and Entertainment

September 29, 2023

From: Montana Film Festival

Thursday, October 12th

5:15pm - FANCY DANCE at Theatre 3

Director: Erica Tremblay
Duration: 90 minutes

Since her sister's disappearance, Jax (Lily Gladstone) has cared for her niece Roki (Isabel Deroy-Olson), scraping by on the Seneca-Cayuga Reservation in Oklahoma. Every spare minute goes into finding her missing sister while also helping Roki prepare for an upcoming powwow. At the risk of losing custody to Jax’s father, Frank (Shea Whigham), the pair hit the road and scour the backcountry to track down Roki’s mother in time for the powwow. What begins as a search gradually turns into a far deeper investigation into the complexities and contradictions of Indigenous women moving through a colonized world and at the mercy of a failed justice system.

5:30PM-Shorts Block 1 at Theatre 2

Director: Double Nickel.
Duration:  66 minutes
An aspiring auteur tries coaxing her dad and uncle into funding her first short film but winds up raising more questions than dollars.

 7:30pm-UNFORGIVEN IN 35MM at Theatre 3

Director:Clint Eastwood
Duration:130 minutes
When a worker is disfigured by a pair of cowboys in Big Whiskey, Wyoming, her fellow brothel workers post a reward for their murder, much to the displeasure of sheriff Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman), who doesn’t allow vigilantism in his town. Two groups of gunfighters, one led by aging former bandit William Munny (Clint Eastwood), the other by the florid English Bob (Richard Harris), come to collect the reward, clashing with each other and the sheriff. Winner of four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Unforgiven is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest Westerns of the past 50 years. Presented in 35mm and hosted by legendary film critic Kenneth Turan.

8:00pm-THE ROYAL HOTEL at Theatre 2

Director:Kitty Green
Duration:91 minutes
Americans Hanna and Liv are best friends backpacking in Australia. After they run out of money, Liv, looking for an adventure, convinces Hanna to take a temporary live-in job behind the bar of a pub called ’The Royal Hotel’ in a remote Outback mining town.
Bar owner Billy and a host of locals give the girls a riotous introduction to Down Under drinking culture but soon Hanna and Liv find themselves trapped in an unnerving situation that grows rapidly out of their control.

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 13TH

4:00pm-Story Ave at Theatre 1

Director:Aristotle Torres
Duration:105 minutes
South Bronx teen Kadir (Asante Blackk) is a gifted visual artist who loses his way following the death of his younger brother. Overcome with grief and struggling with the pressures of school and family, he escapes into the thrilling yet dangerous world of graffiti gangs. To prove himself and join his neighborhood’s ruling gang, Kadir tries to rob MTA conductor Luis (Luis Guzmán) on the Story Ave subway platform, but is caught off guard when Luis agrees to give Kadir the cash if he’ll sit down to a meal with him. Following their conversation and the delicate, transformative friendship that grows out of it, Kadir sees for the first time how his artistic talent could lead to a better life.

5:00pm-ALL DIRT ROADS TASTE OF SALT at Theatre 3

Director: Raven Jackson
Duration: 92 minutes
A lyrical, decades-spanning exploration across a woman’s life in Mississippi, the feature debut from award-winning poet, photographer and filmmaker Raven Jackson is a haunting and richly layered portrait, a beautiful ode to the generations of people and places that shape us.

5:15pm-TOKYO COWBOY at Theatre 2
 
Director:Marc Marriott
Duration: 177 minutes
Brash businessman Hideki arrives in Montana, having convinced his Tokyo bosses he can turn a profitless US cattle ranch into a premiere-performing asset. Yet when his Hardee’s-burger-loving Japanese wagyu-beef expert fails him, Hideki is poised to misfire magnificently unless he identifies a missing element that’s key to the transformation: himself.

6:30PM-Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour

Director: Sam Wrench
Duration: 165 min
Experience Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour, spanning a 17-year award-winning musical career, beginning October 13, 2023. Immerse yourself in this once-in-a-lifetime concert film experience with a breathtaking cinematic view of the history-making tour that Ben Sisario of The New York Times called "A Cultural Juggernaut". Taylor Swift Eras attire and friendship bracelets are strongly encouraged! Don't miss out, get your tickets NOW!

7:00pm-Strange Ways of Life: Three Cowboy Shorts at Theatre 3

Director: Devon Wycoff, Pedro Almodovar, Jake Ames
Duration: 63 min
Alex returns home for the first time since her father's death in order to prepare her family’s farm to be sold at auction. After unearthing a letter she never received, Alex is able to move through her anger and find peace with the memory of her father. But when Alex mistakenly sells an important item in the estate sale, another obstacle is placed in the path of healing.

8:15pm - BLOOD FOR DUST at  Theatre 2

Director: Rod Blackhurst
Duration: 98 min
Ricky (Kit Harington) makes serious money dealing illegal weapons throughout Montana and loves to flaunt it. Traveling salesman Cliff (Scoot McNairy), covers the same territory Ricky runs guns through. Desperate to find some financial relief for his struggling family, Cliff agrees to partner with Ricky, and commit cross-state drug and gun deliveries for a mid-level American cartel boss John (Josh Lucas). When a simple exchange turns into a bloodbath, the pair find themselves in a pressure cooker situation where unlikely drug dealer Cliff must fight as hard as he can to stay alive.

9:00PM-Friday the 13th Part IV: The Final Chapter

Director:Joseph Zito
Duration: 91 min
A carefree lakeside vacation is interrupted by the re-emergence of killer Jason Voorhees (Ted White). After he escapes from a morgue, leaving bodies in his wake, Jason travels to Camp Crystal Lake where a group of friends is staying. The teens meet some locals: Tommy (Corey Feldman) and Trish (Kimberly Beck), as well as secretive hiker Rob (Erich Anderson). As the group of teenagers engages in drunken debauchery, their numbers begin to dwindle, and pieces of the past resurface.

Saturday, October 14th

12:00PM-Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour

Director: Sam Wrench
Duration: 165 min
Experience Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour, spanning a 17-year award-winning musical career, beginning October 13, 2023. Immerse yourself in this once-in-a-lifetime concert film experience with a breathtaking cinematic view of the history-making tour that Ben Sisario of The New York Times called "A Cultural Juggernaut". Taylor Swift Eras attire and friendship bracelets are strongly encouraged! Don't miss out, get your tickets NOW!

3:00PM-Story Ave at Theatre 1

Director:Aristotle Torres
Duration:105 minutes
South Bronx teen Kadir (Asante Blackk) is a gifted visual artist who loses his way following the death of his younger brother. Overcome with grief and struggling with the pressures of school and family, he escapes into the thrilling yet dangerous world of graffiti gangs. To prove himself and join his neighborhood’s ruling gang, Kadir tries to rob MTA conductor Luis (Luis Guzmán) on the Story Ave subway platform, but is caught off guard when Luis agrees to give Kadir the cash if he’ll sit down to a meal with him. Following their conversation and the delicate, transformative friendship that grows out of it, Kadir sees for the first time how his artistic talent could lead to a better life.

3:30PM-I Like Movies

Director: Chandler Levack
Duration: 99 min
Burlington, Ontario, 2003. Hyper-ambitious teenage cinephile Lawrence Kweller dreams of attending film school at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. In order to raise the hefty tuition fee, he gets his dream job at the local video store, Sequels. Wracked with anxiety about his future, Lawrence begins alienating the most important people in his life–his best friend, his single mother–all while developing a complicated friendship with his older female manager, Alana.

4:00PM - FANCY DANCE at Theatre 3

Director: Erica Tremblay
Duration: 90 minutes
Since her sister's disappearance, Jax (Lily Gladstone) has cared for her niece Roki (Isabel Deroy-Olson), scraping by on the Seneca-Cayuga Reservation in Oklahoma. Every spare minute goes into finding her missing sister while also helping Roki prepare for an upcoming powwow. At the risk of losing custody to Jax’s father, Frank (Shea Whigham), the pair hit the road and scour the backcountry to track down Roki’s mother in time for the powwow. What begins as a search gradually turns into a far deeper investigation into the complexities and contradictions of Indigenous women moving through a colonized world and at the mercy of a failed justice system.

5:15PM - BLOOD FOR DUST at  Theatre 2

Director: Rod Blackhurst
Duration: 98 min
Ricky (Kit Harington) makes serious money dealing illegal weapons throughout Montana and loves to flaunt it. Traveling salesman Cliff (Scoot McNairy), covers the same territory Ricky runs guns through. Desperate to find some financial relief for his struggling family, Cliff agrees to partner with Ricky, and commit cross-state drug and gun deliveries for a mid-level American cartel boss John (Josh Lucas). When a simple exchange turns into a bloodbath, the pair find themselves in a pressure cooker situation where unlikely drug dealer Cliff must fight as hard as he can to stay alive.

5:45PM-THE SWEET EAST at Theatre 3

Director: Sean Price Williams
Duration: 104 min
Directed by acclaimed cinematographer Sean Price Williams (Good Time, Funny Pages), The Sweet East is a picaresque journey through the cities and woods of the Eastern seaboard of the United States undertaken by Lillian, a high school senior from South Carolina who gets her first glimpse of the wider world on a class trip to Washington, D.C. Separated from her schoolmates, she embarks on a fractured fairy tale travelogue into America, where she is granted access to a variety of the strange factions that proliferate the present-day unreality of contemporary life.

6:30PM-Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour

Director: Sam Wrench
Duration: 165 min
Experience Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour, spanning a 17-year award-winning musical career, beginning October 13, 2023. Immerse yourself in this once-in-a-lifetime concert film experience with a breathtaking cinematic view of the history-making tour that Ben Sisario of The New York Times called "A Cultural Juggernaut". Taylor Swift Eras attire and friendship bracelets are strongly encouraged! Don't miss out, get your tickets NOW!

7:45PM-Shorts Block 2

Director: J.D. Shields
Duration: 100 min
Joseph, a gentle intellectual with a dry sense of humor, has been living with Parkinson’s for two decades. When his beloved only daughter comes home for a visit with her husband and toddler, they visit a new neurologist who has a simple solution for his debilitating dizziness: new glasses.

8:00PM-The People's Joker

Director: Vera Drew
Duration: 90 min
The People’s Joker originated online, with a call for musicians, actors, and filmmakers to contribute to a “queer coming-of-age film” set inside the Batman universe. More than 150 artists responded, and their contributions are woven into this madcap work of comedic resistance. With a supporting cast that includes SNL‘s Sarah Squirm and Tim & Eric regular David Liebe Hart, The People’s Joker is a brilliant take on the personal nature of fandom, a love letter to trans artists and trans creativity, and an uproarious comedy from exciting new talent Vera Drew.

Sunday, October 15th

12:00PM-Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour

Director: Sam Wrench
Duration: 165 min
Experience Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour, spanning a 17-year award-winning musical career, beginning October 13, 2023. Immerse yourself in this once-in-a-lifetime concert film experience with a breathtaking cinematic view of the history-making tour that Ben Sisario of The New York Times called "A Cultural Juggernaut". Taylor Swift Eras attire and friendship bracelets are strongly encouraged! Don't miss out, get your tickets NOW!

12:30PM-The Flood Girls

Director: Paige Williams
Duration: 120 min
We're thrilled to announce that we're bringing Richard Fifield's captivating novel The Flood Girls to life on the big screen, and we cordially invite you to join us for an exclusive first reading of the script. Prepare to embark on an unforgettable journey as we breathe life into the rich characters and compelling narrative of this Montana female driven story. Your presence at this pivotal moment in the filmmaking process would mean the world to us, so mark your calendars and get ready to experience The Flood Girls like never before. Don't miss this chance to be a part of something truly special! Screenplay written by Christian Palmer, Produced/Directed by Paige Williams.

2:00PM-TOKYO COWBOY at Theatre 2
 
Director:Marc Marriott
Duration: 177 minutes
Brash businessman Hideki arrives in Montana, having convinced his Tokyo bosses he can turn a profitless US cattle ranch into a premiere-performing asset. Yet when his Hardee’s-burger-loving Japanese wagyu-beef expert fails him, Hideki is poised to misfire magnificently unless he identifies a missing element that’s key to the transformation: himself.

3:15PM-Strange Ways of Life: Three Cowboy Shorts at Theatre 3

Director: Devon Wycoff, Pedro Almodovar, Jake Ames
Duration: 63 min
Alex returns home for the first time since her father's death in order to prepare her family’s farm to be sold at auction. After unearthing a letter she never received, Alex is able to move through her anger and find peace with the memory of her father. But when Alex mistakenly sells an important item in the estate sale, another obstacle is placed in the path of healing.

4:00PM - FANCY DANCE at Theatre 3

Director: Erica Tremblay
Duration: 90 minutes
Since her sister's disappearance, Jax (Lily Gladstone) has cared for her niece Roki (Isabel Deroy-Olson), scraping by on the Seneca-Cayuga Reservation in Oklahoma. Every spare minute goes into finding her missing sister while also helping Roki prepare for an upcoming powwow. At the risk of losing custody to Jax’s father, Frank (Shea Whigham), the pair hit the road and scour the backcountry to track down Roki’s mother in time for the powwow. What begins as a search gradually turns into a far deeper investigation into the complexities and contradictions of Indigenous women moving through a colonized world and at the mercy of a failed justice system.

5:00pm-ALL DIRT ROADS TASTE OF SALT at Theatre 3

Director: Raven Jackson
Duration: 92 minutes
A lyrical, decades-spanning exploration across a woman’s life in Mississippi, the feature debut from award-winning poet, photographer and filmmaker Raven Jackson is a haunting and richly layered portrait, a beautiful ode to the generations of people and places that shape us.

5:15PM-I Like Movies

Director: Chandler Levack
Duration: 99 min
Burlington, Ontario, 2003. Hyper-ambitious teenage cinephile Lawrence Kweller dreams of attending film school at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. In order to raise the hefty tuition fee, he gets his dream job at the local video store, Sequels. Wracked with anxiety about his future, Lawrence begins alienating the most important people in his life–his best friend, his single mother–all while developing a complicated friendship with his older female manager, Alana.

5:30PM-Shorts Block 1 at Theatre 2

Director: Double Nickel.
Duration:  66 minutes
An aspiring auteur tries coaxing her dad and uncle into funding her first short film but winds up raising more questions than dollars.

6:30PM-Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour

Director: Sam Wrench
Duration: 165 min
Experience Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour, spanning a 17-year award-winning musical career, beginning October 13, 2023. Immerse yourself in this once-in-a-lifetime concert film experience with a breathtaking cinematic view of the history-making tour that Ben Sisario of The New York Times called "A Cultural Juggernaut". Taylor Swift Eras attire and friendship bracelets are strongly encouraged! Don't miss out, get your tickets NOW!

7:30PM-THE SWEET EAST at Theatre 3

Director: Sean Price Williams
Duration: 104 min
Directed by acclaimed cinematographer Sean Price Williams (Good Time, Funny Pages), The Sweet East is a picaresque journey through the cities and woods of the Eastern seaboard of the United States undertaken by Lillian, a high school senior from South Carolina who gets her first glimpse of the wider world on a class trip to Washington, D.C. Separated from her schoolmates, she embarks on a fractured fairy tale travelogue into America, where she is granted access to a variety of the strange factions that proliferate the present-day unreality of contemporary life.

7:30PM-Shorts Block 2

Director: J.D. Shields
Duration: 100 min
Joseph, a gentle intellectual with a dry sense of humor, has been living with Parkinson’s for two decades. When his beloved only daughter comes home for a visit with her husband and toddler, they visit a new neurologist who has a simple solution for his debilitating dizziness: new glasses.

8:00pm-THE ROYAL HOTEL at Theatre 2

Director:Kitty Green
Duration:91 minutes
Americans Hanna and Liv are best friends backpacking in Australia. After they run out of money, Liv, looking for an adventure, convinces Hanna to take a temporary live-in job behind the bar of a pub called ’The Royal Hotel’ in a remote Outback mining town.
Bar owner Billy and a host of locals give the girls a riotous introduction to Down Under drinking culture but soon Hanna and Liv find themselves trapped in an unnerving situation that grows rapidly out of their control.

Date:  12-15 October, 2023

Time:
October 12, 2023 at 5:15pm
October 13, 2023 at 4:00pm
October 14, 2023 at 12:00pm
October 15, 2023 at 12:00pm

Venue:The Roxy Theater, 718 South Higgins Ave,Missoula, MT 59801

Click Here For More Information.