The city of Missoula sits on Salish land, and Montana is home to twelve tribal nations and seven Indian reservations, each with its own culture, language, identity, and history. Uniquely located to elevate Native voices, Big Sky Documentary Film Festival has a long tradition of celebrating Indigenous documentary film, stories from Indian Country and expressions of Indigenous filmmakers.
The Big Sky Film Institute proudly presents the Native Filmmaker Initiative to bring more Indigenous stories to the festival, support and engage the Indigenous media arts community, and have a greater impact on community youth. The initiative includes special festival programming, youth opportunities and a fellowship program for emerging artists. Browse and click through below to learn more about each program!
The 4th World Indigenous Media Lab is a year-long fellowship for emerging and mid-career Indigenous filmmakers, providing opportunities to develop filmmaking skills and networks through festival participation, hands-on training, masterclasses, workshopping projects in development, pitch activities, and meetings with funders and other industry decision-makers. Fellowship activities will take place throughout 2025 at the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival, Seattle International Film Festival and the Camden International Film Festival. Applications open in September! Learn more >>
The Native Filmmaker Initiative Film Club is a virtual youth education outreach program that takes a curated selection of Indigenous documentary films, made by Indigenous filmmakers, into classrooms across the state of Montana! The fall semester program is announed by later summer - sign up your classroom to join the virtual screening events. Learn more>>
Each year, BSDFF screens a selection of impactful documentaries made by and about Indigenous peoples. The Big Sky open call seeks documentary films directed or produced by Indigenous filmmakers residing in North America including Native American, Alaska Native, Kanaka Maoli, First Nations, Métis and Inuit of Canada, and those of Indigenous heritage from south of the US border and of Pasifika heritage living in North America. Submissions in this no-cost category may be of any length, form, genre and subject matter. Learn more >>
Major support for the Native Filmmaker Initiative is provided by:
NFI youth programs supported in part by:
