LA GRANDE — For the last 15 years, the Eastern Oregon Film Festival has been one of the premiere cultural events this side of Deadman Pass. On two occasions, MovieMaker Magazine has even dubbed it among the 25 best film festivals on the planet.

This year, director Christopher Jennings is taking us back to its roots: getting some locals into a room and making a movie.

Over the course of just two weeks, Jennings and his team will have gone from the first nuggets of an idea to a finished product ready for public screening.

As the initial meeting developed during the evening of Aug. 1, the folks volunteering their time and expertise came around to focusing on the notably intense wildfire season Eastern Oregon is undergoing.

With the notorious Durkee fire sitting atop the charts at nearly 300,000 acres burned, it and 30,000 other fires have leveled nearly five million acres to ash in 2024 in the state of Oregon, and there’s no sign that things are slowing down.

Hundreds of miles of driving, hours of footage, several interviews, and a bunch of workshopping later, what is shaping up to be a 10-minute documentary piece about the firefighting experience is coming together.

The film will premiere Friday, Aug. 16 at 8 p.m. at the HQ, 112 Depot St. in La Grande.

The event will be open to the public with free admission. Come meet the filmmakers, talk about living in this smoky time, and kick off year 15 of the Eastern Oregon Film Festival, which is set for Oct. 17-19 in La Grande. For updates, visit eofilmfest.com.

Meet the author

This month sees Go! Eastern Oregon welcome B. E. Grey to its team of contributing writers as Go!’s very own film critic. And while Grey may be new to the area, rest assured that she’s right at home with this gig. At the ripe old age of 23, Grey has studied movies and their history for a decade, has collaborated with industry professionals on various projects, and has focused in particular on examining queer and arthouse cinema.

Her core principles as a critic:

• All art deserves proper analysis and contextualization.

• Highlighting perspectives from marginalized identities is essential to art’s success and growth.

• Print and other physical media’s continued existence and accessibility are paramount.

• Agnès Varda’s “Cléo from 5 to 7” (1962) is definitely the best movie ever made.

Grey intends to complete a degree at Eastern Oregon University, just like her wife, while living in La Grande.

— B. E. Grey