Best of Fest Encore Screening
From Oscar-winning filmmakers Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, Wild Life follows conservationist Kris Tompkins on an epic, decades-spanning love story as wild as the landscapes she dedicated her life to protecting.
After falling in love in mid-life, Kris and the outdoorsman and entrepreneur Doug Tompkins left behind the world of the massively successful outdoor brands they'd helped pioneer -- Patagonia, The North Face, and Esprit -- and turned their attention to a visionary effort to create National Parks throughout Chile and Argentina. Wild Life chronicles the highs and lows of their journey to effect the largest private land donation in history.
Director Biography
Jimmy Chin grew up in Mankato, Minnesota and graduated from Carleton College in Northfield. An accomplished climber, he began his filmmaking career in 2003, and, with his wife, Chai Vasarhelyi, has directed The Rescue (2021) and Return to Space (2022), as well as the Oscar-winning Free Solo (2019).
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi is an award-winning filmmaker who grew up in New York and is a graduate of The Brearley School and holds a B.A. in Comparative Literature from Princeton. She is the director of numerous documentaries, including, with her husband Jimmy Chin, Meru (2015) and Free Solo (2019), which won that year’s Academy Award for Best Documentary.