A PLACE SORT OF.

Andy Smetanka

Total Fest friend, musician, writer and filmmaker Andy Smetanka just announced that he's raising money for a new project: the documentary about Missoula. Yep, that's the correct article. He's planning to make the definitive film about this weird vortex where five valleys intersect. And my guess is it won't have much to do with trout fishing. I guess we also should add that he's the one responsible for Total Fest's cinematic debut, and only actual made-with-film Film that we know of about Total Fest. Total Fest Forever captures the important part of Total Fest that happened at the river, and in backyards: the hanging out, conversations, laughing, potato guns.. It makes us a little teary-eyed watching it!

 The film's crowdfunding page is here, and deserves a generous action on your part. A large part of the Missoula we love has to do with people like Andy, who, god love 'em, really want to make movies about World War I (And We Were Young), Volumen, the Fireballs of Freedom, Bukowski Stories, and Missoula. We know you might get a little tired of us encouraging you to direct your business this way and that, mostly toward our sponsors and friends, but we do think it's a worthy thing. We actually think you should be eating at the Burns St. Bistro, drinking Black Coffee while listening to Ear Candy vinyl and wearing a Betty's shirt and thinking about going to Big Dipper, and then Kettlehouse while your Subaru gets fixed at Kent Bros. We truly believe all that. And, likewise, we truly believe that getting in as a shareholder on a Smetanka film is a unique and special thing. It's a modest budget in the grand scheme, and we think this is the art and culture that matters, and we sure hope you agree with that.

This is Andy's second crowd-fund. The first was the beautiful stop-animation World War I epic And We Were Young, which debuted earlier this year and has been screening steadily since. So, Smetanka does what he says he's going to do and has a record of completing what he sets out to. He has officially stuck his neck out out to raise the modest sum of $25,000, largely to buy and process Super 8 film to make a movie about Missoula. We encourage you to spend what you can afford to make this happen. Thank you.