'Feels Good' film will show during Thaw Out Film Festival
April 10, 2017
A short film developed in part by UAF faculty and students will be shown in the Hess
Recreation Center on April 15 as a part of the Thaw Out Film Festival hosted by the
UAF Film Club. The festival starts at 7 p.m.
“Feels Good,” was written and directed by Andrew Okpeaha MacLean of Barrow, Alaska.
Maya Salganek, UAF assistant professor of film and media arts, served as executive
producer, and UAF students in the Film Reel Alaska Mentoring Experience program worked
as crew.
The UAF Student Film Club has produced an annual film festival on the UAF campus for
over 20 years. This year, eight student films will be featured in addition to "Feels
Good." Most were produced by members of the Film Club. These films include original
narratives, documentaries, and music videos:
- "Rubber Ducky" — Silas Firth
- "Reel Therapy" — Joe Yates and Daniel Walker
- "Life on a Unicycle" — Josiah Martin
- "Purse" — Sarah Williams and Andrew Glynn
- "Shock" — Andrew Glynn
- "Promise" — Jerry Swanson
- "Once Upon A Time" — Montana Troyer
- "Paper Cuts" — Ryan Osborne
“Feels Good” tells the story of Kelvin, played by Jake Waid, a Tlingit man brought to the big city of Fairbanks in pursuit of work. After his car breaks down he is picked up by Russ (Allan Hayton), a Gwich’in man who is looking for his runaway daughter (Quannah Potts).
The film was selected to appear in the imagineNATIVE Film and Media Arts Festival in Toronto in fall 2016. The imagineNATIVE Film and Media Arts Festival draws thousands of filmmakers and spectators each year. The nonprofit organization that runs the festival seeks to prompt a greater understanding of indigenous peoples and cultures through the presentation of contemporary indigenous-made media art.
Salganek is founding director of the UAF Film Reel Alaska Mentoring Experience, also known as FRAME. She has produced features, documentary and educational films, and curates film festivals while teaching film production and showcasing indigenous storytellers. She was co-producer of the feature film “Chronic Town” (Sundance Official Selection 2008), and producer of narrative features in 2012’s “alaskaLand.” Through FRAME, she produced “Mining for Ruby” (2014). Salganek is currently working on post-production for the short film “Bodies of Water,” written by former student Adrina Knutson.
The UAF Film Club meets on Thursdays, 1:05-1:50 p.m. in Theatre Room 101.
The Theatre and Film Department is part of the UAF College of Liberal Arts, which is the largest of UAF’s academic units and includes arts, humanities, social sciences and language disciplines.
CONTACT: Naomi Horne, nehorne@alaska.edu, 907-474-6464
ON THE WEB: https://www.uaf.edu/theatrefilm/filmclub/, www.uaf.edu/cla, www.mayasalganek.com