by Ezabelle Janssen, Senior Staff Writer

JACKSON COUNTY (GG) — A film lasts a moment, but what they share can stay with audiences for a lifetime. 

That was the idea behind the Walter Anderson Museum of Art’s inaugural Fish Eye Film Festival, the first environmental film festival of its kind in Mississippi. Over three days, from June 11th to June 13th, the festival brought together filmmakers, students, educators, and conservationists to celebrate the power of art. They challenged audiences to look closely at the world around them and imagine how they could help it. 

The idea grew from the museum’s partnership with the National Geographic Society’s Slingshot Challenge, a program encouraging students ages 13 to 18 to identify environmental problems in their communities and tell those stories through one-minute films. 

For James, the museum’s program coordinator and director of the Slingshot Challenge, the festival was never just about screening movies. It was about showcasing the work students have been doing all year. “We’re doing this, and you all can do it too,” he said. “Hopefully it opens the doors for more students to participate and gets more buzz about what is important to these kids and what environmental issues we can solve in the state.”

But James quickly realized those one-minute submissions deserved something bigger. 

Over the past year, the museum worked alongside Mississippi filmmakers and educators, including Glenn Payne, Anthony Williams, Reith Gibson, Bech Evans and John Kelly Shelburne, to document students’ creative journeys. Together, they produced an original docuseries, organized workshops and panel discussions, secured feature films, and built the festival from the ground up. 

For many of the student filmmakers, the projects began in their own backyards. 

One documentary followed Moss Point students as they investigated chronic flooding in their community. Their film explored the environmental challenges residents face, as well as the filmmaking process itself, showing how documenting those stories changed the students’ own understanding of the issues around them. 

Those kinds of projects embody what the festival hopes to accomplish: empowering young people to see themselves as storytellers capable of creating meaningful change.

“I love that we’re listening to these kids,” James said. “Yeah, we help them along the way, but a lot of these ideas and passions stem from these middle schoolers that care about their backyards.” 

The festival also highlighted the broader impact filmmaking can have. 

“In this TikTok and one-minute content age, it’s really hard for people to digest and sit with an idea,” James said. “A film sort of forces and cushions that experience. It allows people to be fully immersed.” 

Unlike nearly any other art form, he explained, film-watching engages all of the senses while asking audiences to do something increasingly rare: pay attention. “It’s an experience unlike any other.” 

That belief resonated throughout the festival. 

Reith Gibson, co-owner of Take Action Design and one of the festival’s filmmaking partners, said bringing local storytellers together creates opportunities that extend well beyond the screen. 

“When you get local storytellers together that can actually make an impact and tell a story that reflects on environmental issues, I think that’s a huge asset,” Gibson said. “It’s an investment into the local creative and local film community.” 

Savanna Jones, founder of Little Lighthouse Productions and president of the Mississippi Film Alliance, believes the festival fills two important gaps at once. 

“People don’t consider Mississippi a film hub,” Jones said. “So to tie those two together, I think it’s very important to have a film festival like this. One, to show that local filmmakers do exist here in Mississippi, and two, to show the different environmental issues and resources throughout the state.” 

Growing Mississippi’s filmmaking industry was an intentional part of the festival’s mission. 

Alongside student films and documentaries, attendees participated in filmmaker panels, networking sessions, and workshops that connected aspiring creators with industry professionals. Organizations like the Mississippi Film Alliance offered resources, mentorship opportunities, and grant information for filmmakers looking to build careers without leaving the state. 

After the final film screening, over 270 people attended. Workshops reached capacity, conversations spilled out of theaters, and organizers left already thinking about what comes next.

“I think we did it,” James said. “Everybody’s response has been really supportive from the community.” 

The museum plans to continue the festival, but “The students come first, and the film festival comes second,” said James. “They really lead the way.” 

For a first-year festival, Fish Eye accomplished something increasingly difficult: it reminded audiences that filmmaking is not simply entertainment. 

It can preserve disappearing coastlines, document overlooked communities, amplify voices that might otherwise go unheard, and, most importantly, it can transform young people from observers into advocates.

(Photos by Ezabelle Janssen/The Gazebo Gazette)