We’re coming for you San Francisco.
Excited to bring a piece of our southern coast to the west coast at the San Fran Doc Film Festival next Thursday, May 28 at 2:00 PM!
Some Kind of Refuge is screening at the Nantucket Film Festival! @nantucketfilmfestival
Excited to share our film with a Cape Cod audience.
More soon 🌊
@hotdocs_ , here we come!
Honored to share that our film will have its international premiere at the festival this year.
Deeply grateful to our team, collaborators, and the community. We can’t wait to continue to share this story with the world 🕊️🤍
Our first Sundance — the films in our block were so inspiring and really pushed me to step up and be braver and more honest in my own work. I usually make films that are rooted in intimate, local spaces, so seeing Some Kind of Refuge connect with audiences from all over meant more than I can put into words. Grateful.
This wouldn’t have happened without the extraordinary team who poured their hearts into this film and carried it all the way here.
Thank you, Sundance — truly, again and again.
Director @alexandrakern :
“I grew up a stone’s throw from the Mississippi River, spending my childhood on the levees that felt like mountains. I played pretend there, dreaming up whole worlds along the riverbank.
Nineteen years later, @colincadarette reached out with an idea to explore together what remains of a community hidden just beyond the levee. We met at @sundanceorg 2024 and embarked on a two year journey into a world across the river from my childhood home, yet far beyond anything I’d imagined. In seven days, we can’t wait to share this place and the quiet wisdom of the people who call it home.”
Some Kind of Refuge premieres 1.24.26 at 9:15PM in The Yarrow Theatre as a part of Short Film Program 3
“It’s different here. Your body goes back to its true nature, which is harmony.” - Jules Cote
Jules Cote lived for years as a fur trapper, spending months alone in a remote cabin. It was his wife who found the Batture, and together they built their home with materials foraged from the river. With her gone, Jules’ life centers on spiritual contemplation and making everything by hand.
“A fringe is a great place to be.” - Macon Fry
Macon Fry stumbled upon the batture in 1985. A chance encounter at the Maple Leaf Bar led to a late night conversation at a semi-aquatic shack on the river. Rent was going from 75 to 100 dollars a month, so the lease was up for grabs. Macon has lived on the batture ever since, spending the last 20 years researching and archiving its history.
Image 1 - The batture is the flooded land between a river at low-water stage and a levee, used especially to describe such land along the lower Mississippi River.
Image 2 - The first recorded settlement on the batture was in 1803, just after the Louisiana Purchase.
Image 3 - On the batture the homes slowly sink into the muddy bank, making life there a cycle of building and rebuilding. Jules Cote puts it simply, “You know, The homes are just always walking back into the river.”
Some Kind of Refuge world premieres at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival in The Short Film Program.
My deepest gratitude to the batture community, and especially to Jules and Macon, for opening their homes, porches, and hearts. Their wisdom is priceless. We created this film as a living memory of one of the last outsider settlements in America.
Shoutout to my hometown of New Orleans and the locals who made this happen - this one's for you.
Colin - this film would not exist without you. Your intuition and commitment to honoring mission and quality as a north star remind me why I do this.
Thank you to our EPs Harry, Julie, and Chris for believing in us. And to my brilliant collaborators and creative life partners @veraeric , @victorartesona , @annequin , @oberhofer , @sderlug , @gypsysound … and so many more. You inspire me every day.
I cannot wait to hear what ya’ll see in this project we’ve put a whole lotta love into. 🤍
