The 22nd New Zealand Mountain Film and Book Festival launched at the Lake Wānaka Centre on Friday with an awards presentation, before the audience settled in to watch the first of 64 films screening over the next five days.
The festival, a popular event, also includes an art exhibition, trade show and a great stack of books about people and their interactions with wild places.
Festival co-director Mark Sedon said he was excited about hosting this year’s guest speaker, Italian winter climbing expedition specialist and rescue helicopter pilot Simone Moro.
"I have not met him yet but I have heard about him and read about him for decades," Mr Sedon said.
"He is so focused on winter expeditions.
Mr Moro’s costs were being paid for by the festival’s charitable trust, using unspent money left over from a grant by the government’s Regional Events Fund made during the Covid pandemic.
"He is just here for a week, so I have organised for some mountain runners to take him out," Mr Sedon said.
Mr Moro will also host the festival’s youth programme, exclusively for those aged under 18, on Monday morning and speak again at another festival session in Queenstown on Thursday evening.
The festival usually draws at least 3000 people in Wānaka, 1500 in Queenstown and up to 4000 online.
Mr Sedon said ticket sales had picked up well in recent days.
"We were 10% down on the last few years.
"It is the cost of living, for sure," he said.
There were just five or six full festival passes left earlier this week, which he hoped would be sold before opening night.
The festival also features several films made by women, and there is a Wahine Adventure Night on Tuesday.
The festival moves to Queenstown’s Memorial Hall on Thursday and Friday.
The online festival runs from July 1-31.
MORE INFO:
The New Zealand Mountain Film and Book Festival prize winners have been previously published in the Wānaka Sun.
The full list and programme are on the festival’s website, mountainfilm.nz.
