The First Film Festival 1983

by

Barry Grimes

Original 1983 NPFF Artwork by William Nealy

In 1981 the Russell Fork was the holy grail of the hair boating set. BWA club member Sam Moore, one of the most intrepid paddlers ever produced by that organization decided his time had come to score a personal first descent. Terry Weeks and Barry Grimes, two BWA amateur photographers felt that the historic run should be documented for the club membership. The result was the 15 minute, super 8mm film creatively titled “The Russell Fork”, a TBS (Terry, Barry & Sam) production.

When shown at a monthly meeting in 1982 it created an uproar, partially because everyone loved it and at least one member present with her 8 year old son hated it. (It seems that she became perturbed at a 3 second flash of a topless woman with 3 breasts). Boating films in those early pre-video days were mostly 8mm, 16mm or 35mm film, a difficult and often expensive medium to work with. Consequently, paddling films tended to be documentaries usually depicting expeditions where whitewater rapids played the role of menacing impediment to be portaged or simply endured by the foolhardy and brave. (Russ Nichols excellent film “Fast and Clean” was a notable exception). “The Russell Fork” however was pure whitewater with steep drops, throbbing music, great wreaks and club hero Sam makin’ it look easy. T,B, & S were heartily congratulated (or vilified).

Present at that meeting was Bob Sehlinger, BWA member, paddler, and Menasha Ridge Press publisher. Bob was inspired and later put forth a visionary idea: if the BWA would host and work it, his company would financially back a film festival that would bring together other paddling shows from across the country. A core group of high energy BWA people including Sam Moore, Terry Weeks, Barry Grimes, Don Spangler, John Davis, John Lovett, Dave Weiland, and Beuren Garten met with Bob. It was decided that the BWA couldn’t pass up an opportunity to have a huge party, paid for by someone else, where they could invite the world to bring and show their boating home movies and slides. Not only would it be fun, but it would be a unique opportunity for amateur and professional film makers to exchange ideas and strut their stuff before an audience of paddlers. The National Paddling Film Festival splashed into existence.

The BWA had no idea how many films could be attracted or if anyone would even come. October 22 & 23,1983 was picked as the date (at the end of Gauley season). Buoyed by a full page $1000 ad in Canoe Magazine provided by Menasha Ridge Press, calls and letters began to come in. The film committee found that the newly completed Kentucky Horse Park had not heard of the BWA and so welcomed the club to use their “party barn”, a huge, empty, former tobacco barn set in the middle of a cow pasture.

Only one problem still faced the club - the need to actually build 2 theaters within the barn. BWA construction magnate Mike Weeks volunteered himself and two unsuspecting members of his construction crew to complete the task. Using roll after roll of black plastic, thousands of staples and innumerable 2x4’s the theaters were completed. Dave “Dad” Weiland, the BWA chef of “Dad’s Dinner Theater “ fame agreed to cook breakfast, lunch and dinner for the attending masses. Popcorn poppers, TV’s, slide projectors were moved in. A couple of hundred folding chairs were unfolded, TV stations were notified and since it had been built - they came.

The barn was adjacent to the campground and folks started rolling in that Friday night. By the time the competition began on Saturday morning there were about 150 people and 23 film, slide and video presentations. It had been decided that everyone who entered would get a showing. There were no time limits established and the competition was set up so that video was paired with 16mm film and slides competed with 8mm film. There were 6 judges and they were required to judge all 23 entries - or roughly 6 hours of presentations! Entries included the Suwannee, Gallatin, Yellowstone, Nantahala, Bio Bio, Russell Fork, Dolores, Ocoee and Colorado rivers. Also there were shows on the Pacific Ocean, Mill Creek, hypothermia, and the lowhead dam thriller “The Drowning Machine”. Rounding out the entries was a film about a 7000 mile canoe expedition across Canada and Alaska and the first Ocoee Rodeo video. 11 states were represented with 9 entries from Kentucky and 8 from the BWA alone.

Barry Grimes was charged with showing the 8mm and slide shows with John Davis presiding as the video and 16mm film Tsar. Since the theaters had been built back to back with only thin plastic and a couple of mattress for sound proofing a small “sound level war” developed as John and Barry tried to drown out each other’s encroaching audio. Then just before lunch the volume was increased even more as a torrential downpour of rain hammered away on the tin roof of the barn. The Rain Gods had honored the NPFF with their presence in a big way and there was not a paddler in the house that didn’t welcome them. The rain stayed all day and turned the cow pasture outside the barn into a quagmire. With the rain continuing, the competition wound to a close and Dad’s Dinner Theater, working from an attached kitchen, served up steamship rounds of beef, ham, chicken and dumplings inside the barn. It had been raining so hard that the Horse Park people were persuaded to allow the festival to have the party in the lobby of the park visitor center. A strong bluegrass band named “Stony Creek” picked and the BWA’s own Women In Rubber made everyone grin as the first film festival party blasted deep into Sunday morning.

Dad Weiland, the hardiest party animal the BWA has seen to date, did not slack off that night and eventually stumbled to his truck at the campground just before dawn on Sunday morning. Not long after Dad had drifted off to C-boat dreamland he was awakened by a camper demanding the promised biscuits and gravy. The gravy evidently would fit where Dad told the camper to put it, but the biscuits would not - and neither were happy about it.

Sunday morning had been scheduled to include the presentation of awards and a reshowing of the winning entries. At 10am, the allotted start time for the awards ceremony, there were about 20 people present. Half were BWA clinging to their coffee cups, and the rest included a few of the winning filmmakers and those who had unfortunately left their boats at home. Everybody else had gone boating on the leftover bounty of the Rain Gods. The slide/8mm Best of Show winner was aptly titled “Kayaking In the Bluegrass” by Lynda Matusek with “Whitewater Rodeo” by John C. Davis and “Liquid Madness” by Paul Sharp sharing the video/16mm Best of Show. Of the 23 entries, 13 went away with awards.

That first Film Festival was an awesome event, but the BWA has evolved and hopefully improved upon that original festival. In 1984 the NPFF moved to the University of Kentucky campus. In ‘85 the date was changed to the last weekend in February and the Friday /Saturday format instituted. ‘91 saw the creation of the “commercial - professional” category, a competition of paddling related marketing presentations. In ‘93 the coveted, audience judged, “Paddler’s Choice Award” appeared. In ‘95 the BWA became partners in the NPFF with the American Canoe Association and American Whitewater. In 1997 the BWA welcomed the Kern River Alliance as west coast hosts of the NPFF attempting an experimental “East” and “West” two phase competition that has now morphed into the NPFF Roadshow allowing organizations across the world to raise more funds for waterway conservation. Also new in ‘97 was the acceptance of computer generated image entries for competition and the creation of the NPFF website. In 2003 the NPFF made a big move to the Kentucky Theater and thanks to suggestions from volunteers, image artists, sponsors and the festival audiences, the NPFF has become a much anticipated event and a significant contributor to conservation.  Another Big move occurred in 2005 when the Lexington Center became the temporary home with the Thomas Hunt Morgan house becoming the home the following year in 2006.

The National Paddling Film Festival has been instrumental in raising the quality of paddling films and has been a fertile meeting ground for paddle sport filmmakers from across the world. With the on going strong support from the boating community the National Paddling Film Festival will continue to evolve, endure, inspire and thrill audiences for years to come.