The Films

• Year 2025
• Country USA
• Runtime 15 min
• Director Kevin Paczesny & Jada Pearson

Filmmaker in Attendance, Family Friendly, Michigan Premiere, World Premiere

In November 2016 Gatlinburg, Tennessee was devastated by a wildfire that impacted thousands of families and businesses. Beyond the Ashes tells the stories of the families and businesses affected by the fire and how one city demonstrated resilience during its darkest times.

• Year 2023
• Country Canada
• Runtime 16 min
• Director Gregg McLachlan

Filmmaker in Attendance, Family Friendly, Michigan Premiere

Filmed over two field seasons spanning three years, The Bird House tells the story of the impacts of weather, storms and high water at Canada’s most isolated bird banding and research station located at the tip of a 20-mile long wind-swept sandspit in the middle of Lake Erie.

• Year 2025
• Country Canada
• Runtime 21 min
• Director Gregg McLachlan

Filmmaker in Attendance, Family Friendly, Michigan Premiere

A hauntingly beautiful conservation documentary that follows wildlife researchers from Birds Canada and the University of Waterloo deep into the forests of southwestern Ontario, Canada to uncover the mysterious world of the Eastern Whip-poor-will — a nocturnal bird whose call once echoed across the night, and is now slowly falling silent.

• Year 2025
• Country USA, Mexico
• Runtime 20 min
• Director Julián Trejo Bax

Filmmaker in Attendance, Subject in Attendance, Has Subtitles, First Time Filmmaker, World Premiere, Making Waves Recipient, Staff Pick

After turning her Chicago home into a monarch butterfly sanctuary, Claudia Galeno-Sánchez, an environmental activist, Mexican immigrant, and mother is on a mission to save the monarch butterfly, an important symbol for both her family and millions of others in the United States.