BY KAREN BOSSICK

Fifteen-time award-winning filmmaker Naomi McDougall ones, will launch the Wood River Valley reGEN Film Club from 6 to 7:15 p.m. Monday, Nov. 6

reGEN Film Club is a curated series of six films and discussions that will be offered throughout the course of a year that is designed to offer participants deeper connections to the power of film, community relationships and to the world around us.

McDougall Jones, a women-in-film activist, first came to the Wood River Valley as the inaugural  writer-in-residence of the Hemingway House through The Community Library. After falling in love with the valley, the community, and the land, she and her husband, Stephen McDougall Graham, moved here permanently in the fall of 2020.

Stephen joined the Wood River Orchestras as its principal violinist and was soon elected as the Blaine County Clerk. Naomi became Artistic Director for The Liberty Theatre Company.

McDougall Jones is the author of “The Wrong Kind of Women: Inside Our Revolution to Dismantle the Gods of Hollywood,” which was inspire by her TED Talk “The Wrong Kind of Woman.” She has worked on such films as “Bite Me” and “Imagine I’m Beautiful.”

While bringing her talents to bear in the local community, she has continued her national filmmaking career. “Shayda,” for which she was executive producer, won the Audience Award at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. The film, about a young Iranian mother who takes refuge in an Australian women’s shelter, was purchased for distribution by Sony Picture Classics and is now Australia’s official entry for the 2024 Best International Feature Film Academy Award.

 Now McDougall Jones is bringing her work with multi-award-winning filmmakers and films into the local community with the Wood River Valley reGEN Film Club.

“It has been deeply meaningful to engage with this community in so many ways since moving here--through my work with The Liberty Theatre Company and other local theater companies, as well as serving as campaign manager for both my husband Stephen’s race for County Clerk and Sen. Ron Taylor’s campaign,” she said. “And also there’s this whole central part of my work and career that I haven’t yet been able to introduce to this community. It is thrilling to be doing just that with the reGEN Film Club.”

The reGEN Film Club series will give participants an opportunity to discover hidden indie film gems, hear perspectives and commentaries from internationally-acclaimed filmmakers curated and moderated by McDougall Jones and discuss the films in structured sessions to expand perspectives and build community relationships.

McDougall Jones says it’s like a book club, but for movies.

Participants will watch the assigned films ahead of time on their own schedule.

At each meeting the selected film will be introduced by the reGEN filmmaker who selected the film. That filmmaker will share their perspective and some insider baseball commentary on how they watch the film.

Breakout groups will be given a series of questions to guide discussion. The groups will then be brought back together for a larger discussion on an additional thought-provoking question.

Each event will wrap up with a collective “Rotten Tomatoes”-type rating of the film. To learn more, visit https://www.eventbrite.com/e/wood-river-valley-regen-film-club-tickets-708571204547.

McDougall Jones founded reGEN media in 2021 alongside Indigenous Canadian impact producer Charlene San Jenko. She brought several females film producers to Idaho Basecamp’s Big Lost Campus to explore the question, “What does storytelling need to be to build us a bridge to a more beautiful future?” as she launched what is the first-and-only Indigenous-owned and female-led media studio. It’s hoped the effort will shift culture by transforming the narratives being told.

Now, in addition to producing six feature films over the next two years, reGEN media is launching a network of reGEN Film Clubs, seeding a continent-wide Theatrical Distribution Network for the kinds of soulful, transforming films that are no longer being distributed by mainstream media companies in the age of Marvel and streaming.

“We have a base of 40 local community hubs that we’ll be starting these film clubs in. But, since the Wood River Valley is both my home and the place where reGEN media began, I knew that we had to launch the initiative here first,” said McDougall Jones.

Those wishing to participate in the film club can purchase an annual membership-- $150 for all six films. For more information, email naomi@regenimpactmedia.com or call 970-618-5219.

After the initial gathering on Nov. 6, other film discussion nights will be held on select Monday evenings through August 2024.