MISSOULA — On Sunday, the Montana Film Festival wrapped up its final day of taking Big Sky Country to "big screen country."
The event took over Missoula's Roxy Theater for multiple days of celebrating multiple independent films, from short to feature-length movies.
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"You see these big East Coast, West Coast premieres in Los Angeles and New York City and we wanna bring those experiences to Montanans," Joshua Moyar, the Roxy Theater's film festival coordinator, said.
The event also meant more exposure for independent filmmakers with movies such as "Honeyjoon," "Baby Love," and "Last Stand at Butte City" screening, to name just a few.
"I think just giving the opportunity to these filmmakers to get their work out is a really like amazing thing that the Roxy is doing," Bailee Scheuffele, a festival attendee, said.
It's not just screening the films though. Attendees also interacted with the directors behind the work.
Scheuffele had a live experience with the Original Montana Film Guide podcast that included Rob Burnett, the director of "In Memoriam," a film that features Lily Gladstone.
It was Burnett's first time being a part of Montana's film frenzy, but that is not the only first he's celebrating through his visit.
"It's my first time in Montana, and I love it here, and I think you people are geniuses for living here," he told MTN.
After seeing Missoula, he hopes this is not the last Missoula sees of him or his films.
"It's incredible," he added. "I mean, I got off the plane, I looked, came down that escalator, and you look out and you see those mountains, and I just thought, 'I've got to move to Missoula.'"
The event ended Sunday night on a high note, but with a low budget.
"We're having our Microbudget Missoula block, so it's all films that were made in Missoula with little to no budget so it's really fun," Moyar said. "It's a celebration of local uplifting filmmaking."
If you're a movie lover who couldn't make it out this year, The Roxy shifts their focus to their next big project that you can mark in your calendar.
"If you like film festivals in general, the Roxy does the International Wildlife Film Festival that's coming up in April, and this is year 50 of that one, so it's sort of a big anniversary year," said Moyar.
