Waterwalker – A 40th Anniversary Showing
November 17, 2026, 6:30pm
Ely’s Historic State Theater
238 E Sheridan St, Ely, MN 55731
Free Admission
A free screening in Ely celebrating the National Film Board of Canada’s 40th-anniversary restoration and theatrical re-release of Bill Mason’s masterpiece
For generations of paddlers, Waterwalker is the reason they first picked up a paddle. Forty years after its release, Bill Mason’s canoe classic has been restored in 4K and is back on the big screen. After opening its anniversary tour in Canada, the film comes to Ely for its first U.S. screening, at the gateway to the Boundary Waters.
Filmmaker, painter, and canoeist Bill Mason takes us along the rugged north shore of Lake Superior and into the Ontario backcountry: paddling whitewater, painting at the water’s edge, and reflecting on what wild places give us and what we owe them in return. Set to a haunting score by Bruce Cockburn, it’s a love letter to wilderness whose message of caring for the land feels even more urgent today than it did in 1984.
Whether you first saw it on a VHS tape at summer camp or have never seen it at all, come experience Waterwalker the way it was meant to be seen.
Free admission.
