Lone Pine Film Festival 2025
The 35th Lone Pine Film Festival is coming soon!
The festival takes place in Lone Pine, California, on Columbus Day Weekend, October 9-12, 2025.
This
year’s theme is “Reel Adventure in Lone Pine: Color – Action – Romance in
the Alabama Hills.”
As always, plenty of Westerns will be shown, and this year the festival will
also show a number of other types of films and TV shows shot in Lone Pine’s
Alabama Hills, including desert action films and science fiction.
I’ve been attending and writing about the festival every year for over a decade, and this year will be no exception.
Additionally, for the last few years my husband Doug has volunteered as the festival’s guide for horseback location tours. Anyone who’s dreamed of following the trails ridden by the likes of Randolph Scott, Roy Rogers, Audie Murphy, or William “Hopalong Cassidy” Boyd, to name just a few, can sign up for one of his three tours. Horses are provided by McGee Creek Pack Station.
This year the festival’s special guests will include Patrick Wayne, Robert Carradine, Charlotte Barker of the Paramount Archives, Wyatt McCrea, Diamond Farnsworth, Petrine Day Mitchum, Tony Cameron, and many more.
Opening night will feature a 40th anniversary screening of Rustler’s Rhapsody (1985) with star Patrick Wayne in attendance. He’ll be hosted by moderator Rob Word; also participating will be Heath Holland, who recently did a Blu-ray commentary track for the film.
Other screenings at the festival will include:
*The Hopalong Cassidy film Silent Conflict (1948), which like the majority of the films shown at the festival was filmed in Lone Pine.
*Hand Across the Border (1944) starring Roy Rogers, introduced by Charlotte Barker, Paramount’s Director of Film Preservation and Restoration, and Julie Rogers Pomilia, granddaughter of Roy Rogers and Dale Evans.
*The Star Trek: Voyager episode “Basics Part 2” (1996), introduced by the show’s first assistant director Louis Race, who will also guide a location tour and discuss filming the episode.
*The Fiddlin’ Buckaroo (1933) starring Ken Maynard.
*The Loves of Carmen (1948) with Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford.
*Flame of Araby (1951) starring Maureen O’Hara and Jeff Chandler. This will be a fun “Friday Night at the Movies” theme, presenting the film as it would have been seen in theaters, with short subjects, a cartoon, and a newsreel. Film historian C. Courtney Joyner will host.
*Bullets Don’t Argue (1964), a “spaghetti Western” starring Rod Cameron, introduced by Joyner and Rod Cameron’s son, Tony. I’ve heard Tony Cameron speak at a past festival and found him very interesting and knowledgeable regarding his late father’s career.
*Posse From Hell (1961), starring Audie Murphy and filmed in Lone Pine. Stuntman Diamond Farnsworth, who knew Audie Murphy, will participate in a panel discussion on the film along with Steve Latshaw, Ross Schnioffsky, and C. Courtney Joyner.
*The John Wayne film Tycoon (1947), which was filmed in Lone Pine and will be introduced by Robert Carradine.
*Bad Day at Black Rock (1954), which filmed just outside Lone Pine, introduced by actor Darby Hinton of TV’s Daniel Boone series.
*The silent film Riders of the Purple Sage (1925), introduced by Rob Word and followed by a talk by Festival Tour Coordinator Greg Parker. Parker will narrate a “then and now” slideshow on the film’s Lone Pine locations. Pianist J.C. Munns will provide live music accompaniment for the movie.
There will be a handful of other screenings during the weekend as well.
The Lone Pine Film Festival is unique in that guests can watch a movie and then tour the movie’s locations the same weekend. Location tours will be given for several of the above-listed films.
Other tour themes will include Owens River Locations, Mobius Ravine Locations, a Bar 20 Ranch tour, Audie Murphy movie locations, and a Lone Ranger Canyon Locations tour.
The annual Sunrise Photography Tour will also take place, hosted by “cowboy poet” Larry Maurice, as well as a pair of tours centered on famed photographer Ansel Adams: Ansel Adams in the Alabama Hills and Ansel Adams at Manzanar. The Manzanar National Historic Site is approximately 10 miles north of Lone Pine on Highway 395. Thomas Kelsey will host both of the Adams tours.
Other festival activities include the opening night buffet BBQ in the Museum of Western Film History parking lot; a Western music fundraising concert at Lubken Ranch featuring Kristyn Harris; a nondenominational Sunday “Cowboy Church” service at Spainhower Anchor Ranch; the Sunday afternoon parade down Main Street featuring the festival’s special guests; and the Closing Night Campfire gathering at Spainhower Park.
Lone Pine is on California’s Highway 395 and is an easy drive north from Southern California airports. The town can also be reached flying into Las Vegas or other points north and then driving south.
Highway 395 is one of my favorite places in the world, where I enjoy spending time not only in Lone Pine but driving to points further north including Bishop, Mammoth Lakes, and Bridgeport. Last year we left for the festival a couple days early to enjoy the fall colors outside Bishop, which I highly recommend.
It’s never too late to decide to attend the Lone Pine Film Festival! This is a relaxed, friendly festival where Western fans have ample opportunity to watch movies, visit locations, and chat with fellow guests about movies. I’d love to meet some of my readers in Lone Pine this October!
As noted above, I’ve attended the festival and visited Lone Pine locations a significant number of times over the years. I invite anyone interested in Lone Pine’s history – or visiting the film festival – to check out my past Western RoundUp columns on this subject which are linked below.
Lone Pine movie locations: 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024.
Lone Pine Film Festival: 2019, 2020, 2021, 2023, and 2024.
For more information, please visit the Museum of Western Film History and Lone Pine Film Festival websites.
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– Laura Grieve for Classic Movie Hub
Laura can be found at her blog, Laura’s Miscellaneous Musings, where she’s been writing about movies since 2005, and on Twitter at @LaurasMiscMovie. A lifelong film fan, Laura loves the classics including Disney, Film Noir, Musicals, and Westerns. She regularly covers Southern California classic film festivals. Laura will scribe on all things western at the ‘Western RoundUp’ for CMH.
