12:00-2:00 p.m. – Conquest of the Skies *JHWFF Winner (Family-friendly film)
The power of flight is one of nature’s greatest achievements. From its humble beginnings, over one hundred billion creatures soar through the sky today, from tiny, nectar-drinking hummingbirds to armoured airborne beetles, bizarre winged lizards and sonar-guided bats hunting in the dead of night. Followed by a Q & A discussion.
2:15-3:45 p.m. – Light on Earth *JHWFF Winner (Family-friendly film)
The spectacular and magical light produced by glowworms, fireflies and luminous plankton is known as bioluminescence – light made by living creatures. But those quite familiar glows and flashes are just a tiny, easily observed fragment of a previously unexplored, mysterious realm. Sir David Attenborough will be our guide, as we venture into a world he describes as “utterly unlike our own”. He and a team of the world’s leading scientists take us on a quest into the fascinating realm of living light. Followed by a Q & A discussion with invertebrate zoologist at the National Museum of Natural History, Allen G. Collins and Floyd Shockley, collections manager in the Department of Entomology at the National Museum of Natural History.
4:15-6:30 p.m. – Sixteen Legs *Wildscreen Winner
Giant prehistoric spiders the size of dinner plates try to find love in the dark. As the world rapidly descends into the next period of global mass extinction, a message of hope comes from an unlikely hero: a creature, often reviled, that has survived previous mass extinctions and climatic change in a magical ecosystem hidden beneath one of the world’s last great wildernesses. With spectacular imagery and a dark-fantasy twist, this is a real-world “Charlotte’s Web,” capitalizing on master story-teller Neil Gaiman’s global popularity to bring a story of stability and solitude into our world of rapid change. Followed by a Q & A discussion with co-directors Justin Smith and Niall Doran.
Introductions by Barbara Stauffer, Chief of Community Engagement, National Museum of Natural History, and Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival representative
