BANFF Mountain Film Fest returns to the Keith-Albee

For the second year, Banff Mountain Film Festival will be showing a variety of outdoor recreational films today at 7 p.m. at the Keith-Albee Theater.

Banff Mountain Film Festival has existed since 1976 and features short films and documentaries about mountain culture, sports and the environment. Banff tours over 40 countries, and around 450 communities in the United States.

“Huntington is a community that is well known for its outdoor recreation opportunities,” Chad Steen, assistant director of adventure rec and youth programs, said. “We’re definitely the target market for this.”

Steen said Banff is the largest outdoor recreational film festival in the world.

“Having this come to Huntington has been a two-year work in progress,” Steen said. “It wasn’t the easiest process. We had to sell our community to them, and they picked it up, and we got to.”

Steen said that while there are a lot of pieces focused on sports, there are several cultural pieces as well. Steen said that he hopes people will experience things that they haven’t before and will leave the theater feeling inspired.

“You may have someone who is interested in outdoors but not art or even interested in arts and not outdoors, but Banff mixes the two together,” Steen said. “The event gives them a chance to go out to the Keith-Albee and see a world class event.”

Banff Mountain Film Festival is free for Marshall Students and $10 for the community.

Rachael Cook can be contacted at [email protected].