Join us for a special screening of Mongolia, Valley of the Bears the winner of the 2024 Best Film - Mountain Culture at the Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival.
Mongolia, Valley of the Bears
(France, 2023, 88 min)
Director: Hamid Sardar
Producer: Lato Sensu Productions, Muriel Barra
In Mongolia, Taiga forests and pure waters have kept an entire population nomadic for thousands of years. In the last 30 years, the rich natural resources have fallen prey to illegal hunters and miners, who are often locals. Appointed ranger Jal Tumursukh, a former hunter, now enforces the law of environmental protection, attempting to put an end to poaching, but in the process also threatens cultural tradition.
"Mountain culture is a world of passionate extremes. It can be a playing field or a war zone. A meeting ground where nature is loved or feared, conquered or revered—a wilderness where people fight over the right to consume nature, or protect it. Our winning film explores these conflicting agendas without presenting simple solutions, but by framing an extraordinary story in an exquisite setting that looks like nowhere else on Earth. It’s a movie of many genres. A cinematic spectacle that distills poetry from landscape. An eco-documentary too complex to be doctrinaire. A character drama with a trickster protagonist. A western about an enforcer who fights an outlaw band of poachers by recruiting warriors from their ranks. This year’s Mountain Culture Award goes to a film that takes this ever-expanding niche of cinema to new heights."
- Brian Johnson, 2024 Festival jury member