Film festival brings stories from Southeast to the big screen

Ellie Ruel
2 hours ago
4 min read

Second annual ‘See Stories Live’ event features work from youth filmmakers

By Ellie Ruel

Juneau Independent

Ten short films exploring self, culture and environment directed by Southeast Alaska youth made a public debut during a showing at the Aurora Grand Theatre.

The event showcased work created through mentorship from See Stories, a nonprofit dedicated to creating inclusive communities through visual and audio storytelling.

“The youth is sacred, the stories are sacred,” said Connor Meyer, a cultural media mentor for See Stories.

Meyer said that growing up, he wasn’t allowed in media spaces and didn’t have an outlet to get away from a negative school experience. Now he says he hopes he can be the person he didn’t have.

“I didn’t have that safe person and See Stories gave me the opportunity to offer the space, the people, the technical knowledge to create films,” Meyer said. “I learned as much as I teach. I want to know what they want to see, what’s working and what they’re concerned about, so it was just really built around wanting to start to see them make the change I wish I did. I didn’t do that. They have the opportunity to and that’s so exciting.”

Part of that mentorship, which Meyers said “moves at the speed of trust,” is learning the science behind cameras, angles and film basics. From there the students bring their ideas to life with production assistance.

The shorts shown Tuesday night featured stories from Kake, Angoon, Juneau, Wrangell, and Yakutat. Documentary-style interviews with elders and locals, drone footage of scenery and subtitles were woven into narratives of Indigenous history, weather, climate change, and identity.

Malena Ollaol, Maddy Bass and Mazelle Joseph speak to the audience after a showing of their films at the Aurora Grand Theatre on Tuesday, June 2, 2026. (Ellie Ruel / Juneau Independent)

“My prompt was to make a video about myself. So I made it about the lake I love, the river I love and how I'm connected to it and how the people that you know will continue to be connected to it as long as we say that,” said Mazelle Joseph, a junior at Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé and youth filmmaker during a Q&A after the screenings. “A mother had messaged me that my video was the first time her kid ever heard the Lingít language.  And I thought that was a really beautiful connection because I think I grew up in a household where I heard the language, but I wasn't speaking the language. And now that I'm in my fourth year, learning Lingít I'm glad that I can speak it well enough where I can share it, and know that I'm cohesive and literate.”

Joseph’s film, titled “Walk With Me,” was narrated half in Lingít and half in English, and was filmed on the Dzantik’i Héeni trails. It showed her picking up litter and urging people to stop pollution.

She said her next project will be called “Swim With Me” and focus on opposition to the proposed Cascade Point ferry terminal.

Maddy Bass is also a junior at JDHS, and was a collaborator on an Alaska Youth for Environmental Action film that showed right after Joseph’s. It documented the impact of extreme climate change across the state.

Neither Juneau film was being screened for the first time, but Bass said it was exciting to see them at a community event.

“This theater was built by the community’s hands and we’re showing the community’s films,” she said.

While the festival was timed to coincide with Celebration so that more students could attend the showing, not all of the student directors were present due to ferry delays.

Two pieces directed by students from Angoon were shown — one about the story of Til’Tlein, a Tlingit shaman whose accidental death aboard a whaling boat led to the Angoon Bombardment in 1882, and another about the origin of the Basket Bay Arch House. Another two films, one from Kake and one from Wrangell, explored the culture of fisheries in Alaska and how they’re changing.

Josiah Jackson directed “The Poetry of Kake’s Weather,” an interview-based piece on seasonal shifts in Kake, and said his next project will explore a day in the life of a tour guide.

“My film is based on the beautiful weather and how it changes now and then,” Jackson said. “See Stories inspired me to change my perspective on how I see Kake, how I see it as the weather, how it's all beautiful in nature.”

Meyers noted that the screening also served as a silent auction fundraiser since federal cuts have impacted See Stories’ budget. His mentorship work is now “pro bono,” but he works in production full time — a field he hopes to see his mentees join in the future.

“If I'm out of a job, I did my job,” Meyers said. “I want them to take my job. That's the whole point. And so to see them lean in and be excited, that’s  everything that I could ever hope for in my life.”

• Contact Ellie Ruel at ellie.ruel@juneauindependent.com.