It would be incredibly hard to top the powerhouse slate of films that Mammoth Lakes Film Festival served up in their 10th year this Saturday.
Both hilarious, inspirational, and moving, All I’ve Got & Then Some follows a day in the life of Rasheed, a homeless stand-up comedian living out of his car in Los Angeles. Based on a true story, both the filmmaker and his on-screen persona adhere to the inspirational credo “today is the best day of my life.” So much charisma and love on the screen makes this film a true delight, as directed and conceived of by Tehben Dean and Rasheed Stephens, and starring Stephens in a script based on a true story.
Having booked his first paid stand-up gig, Rasheed wings his way through an audition, helps out a supportive and vibrant street walker friend, Rose (a screen-grabbing performance inhabited by the talented Avise Parsons), rescues an adorable fellow car dweller from an attack, and traverses the metaphorical and literal minefield of Los Angeles.
Both super fun and inspiring, Stephens led the MLFF crowd at the film’s q and A in a rousing affirmation of “today is the best day of my life,” just as his film embodied that emotion.
Paired with this feature was a laugh-out-loud riff on fitness obsession in Beyond Failure. Director and star Marissa Losoya is a winner in a fully relatable short about a woman who thinks she can hip thrust her way into a perfect buttocks and away from her negative internal monologue.
In a deeply serious shift to our viewing, Chloé Leriche’s Atikamekw Suns is a hybrid narrative and documentary.
The film hauntingly depicts the tragic true story of five young people from the Atikamekw First Nation community of Matawan, Quebec in 1977, found dead in a van submerged in a river. The cruel and apathetic response of legal authorities left the suspects responsible to walk free, whether the deaths were due to vehicular manslaughter at the least or a murderous act of racial malignancy.
Both poetic and devastating, the film reveals the loss and suffering of family members and the tribal community at large. The passionate and important q and a following the film included both Leriche and Sean Scruggs, the tribal historian of the Piute tribe of Independence, Calif., near the festival’s location. The erasure of tribal heritage and Native American trauma is a key and ongoing issue in both the U.S and Canada, and requires a spotlight.
Mediha, from Hassan Oswald with a major creative assist from the brave and brilliant protagonist, Mediha Ibrahim Alhamad, is an incredibly important, astonishing film that depicts the amazing, inspiring bravery of its protagonist. Truly compelling and vital, this intense, brilliant film focused on its titular subject.
Mediha is a 13 year old from northern Iraq when introduced, a member of the Yazidi ethnic and religious minority, and survivor of a 2014 ISIS-orchestrated genocide. Through her astonishing video diaries, Mediha and her brothers create an intimate and intensely moving account of their grief and trauma.
In a q and a following this truly must-see film, Hasan, along with Mediha herself, talked about past, present, and future. Mediha is about to commence college in New York, and is heading toward law school, a once almost unimaginable future for the young survivor trapped in a relocation camp in Iraq after her rescue.
There is no way to describe how inspiring and magnetic Mediha herself is, or the film she embodies. The film is a perfectly realized portrait of this passionate burgeoning activist, sure to make her mark on the world, as one would hope her story will as well.
Enormous kudos to MLFF, Hasan, and of course, Mediha herself, for presenting this story and the ongoing crisis for the Yazidi people. It is as important and moving as filmmaking gets.
The film was paired with Cycles, a beautifully narrative take on a documentary short about a generous, caring, divorced mom who is helping to support her kids as an egg donor. The subject is the sister of co-director Tony Oswald, who created the film with spouse and partner Pisie Hochheim. The film follows its subject to a fertility clinic in San Diego, as she movingly grapples with the effects of her donation on both her body and mind.
As a perfect celebration and release from this day of awe-inspiring filmmaking, what could be better than a rousing karaoke celebration with DJ Maurice at Mammoth Lake’s Bar Sierra? Honestly, we can’t imagine a better conclusion to the day’s perfect programming.
Do you wish you were on a cinematic mountain high? It’s still not too late to attend. For more information, click here.
- written by Genie Davis, photos by Jack Burke