Durango native brings feature documentary ‘ADAPTED’ to Independent Film Festival

Anna Soens attempts to become the first paraplegic athlete to summit Mount Baker in the film, “ADAPTED,” playing next week at the Durango Independent Film Festival. (Courtesy of Paul Bikis)

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Anna Soens attempts to become the first paraplegic athlete to summit Mount Baker in the film, “ADAPTED,” playing next week at the Durango Independent Film Festival. (Courtesy of Paul Bikis)

For filmmaker Paul Bikis, bringing his documentary, “ADAPTED,” to next week’s Durango Independent Film Festival will be a homecoming.

Bikis, a Durango native and member of Durango High School Class of 2012, said he began taking an interest in filmmaking at an early age, making ski and bike films starting in middle school.

“I think I had my first short film play at the Abbey Theatre before another ski film back in the day,” he said. “Growing up in a beautiful place, doing fun things, I wanted to share that with other people, and so I realized early on that a camera was my way to show people the world and the way that I saw it.”

After graduating from DHS, Bikis went to journalism school at Western Washington University (a tip of the hat to you, sir). After graduating from college, he moved back to Durango to care for his mother, who had just entered hospice for a degenerative cognitive illness known as Posterior Cortical Atrophy.

He said in the film’s press notes that while he was caring for her, they would go on walks and he’d even get her back on her bicycle and skis with support from Adaptive Sports.

Bikis credits his mother with being foundational to “ADAPTED,” and his experience caring for her motivated him to want to “share a story about inclusivity and the importance of the outdoors.”

Danielle Doelling trains to handcycle 87 miles across the rugged terrain of the White Rim Trail in Canyonlands National Park, Utah. (Courtesy of Paul Bikis)

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Danielle Doelling trains to handcycle 87 miles across the rugged terrain of the White Rim Trail in Canyonlands National Park, Utah. (Courtesy of Paul Bikis)

“While I was taking care of my mom, I was struck by the challenges she faced just to get out of the house. She could not do it on her own, and it was pushing her into a deep depression,” he wrote in the notes. “But with support, she could still do so much. Those experiences gave her a renewed sense of life. When I met Josh, Anna and Danielle, I realized there are many people who don’t have great access to the outdoors. Before my experience with my mom, I had never thought about this.”

Josh, Anna and Danielle are the three stars of “ADAPTED.” In the film, Josh Hancock leads a custom adaptive raft down the Salmon River in Idaho; Anna Soens attempts to become the first paraplegic athlete to summit Mount Baker, a towering 10,781-foot glaciated volcano in Washington state; and Danielle Doelling trains to handcycle 87 miles across the rugged terrain of the White Rim Trail in Canyonlands National Park, Utah.

The three are all paralyzed as the result of traumatic spinal-cord injuries, and Bikis met them through Michael “Hawkeye” Johnson with the GoHawkeye Foundation, based in Telluride. Bikis said his experience caring for his mother introduced him to the broader adaptive sports community, and he saw a need to tell not only people’s stories but also to illustrate the importance of the outdoors to them as well.

The film took seven years to make, he said, adding that there were a few major challenges in getting “ADAPTED” made: financing, the logistics of filming the three athletes’ separate and fairly extreme locations and the challenge of editing more than 200 hours of footage into an almost 90-minute film.

Josh Hancock leads a custom adaptive raft down the wild, scenic Salmon River in Idaho in “ADAPTED.” (Courtesy of Paul Bikis)

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Josh Hancock leads a custom adaptive raft down the wild, scenic Salmon River in Idaho in “ADAPTED.” (Courtesy of Paul Bikis)

“Logistically, we feature three different adaptive adventures, everything from climbing a strata volcano and then more cascades over three days to a five-day handcycling trip around the White Rim Trail to a seven day rafting trip down the Salmon River,” Bikis said. “That was no small feat for the new filmmaker. ... We spent two years editing and went through over 30 different versions of the film trying to figure out how to weave their stories together that felt right. And money was always a challenge. So a lot of times it was in between jobs here and there, you might work on it for a month and then you have to go off and do something to pay the bills, and then come back and do a little more.”

He said he hopes audiences take away a couple of things from the film – education and empowerment.

“We really want to work on changing perceptions and fostering inclusivity within the disability community by highlighting resilience and the achievements of these individuals that I think will help normalize what they’re doing, rather than it being like these big, inspiring things,” Bikis said. “The more content and the more media that shows people who do things a little bit differently, I think it’ll help. We want people to see them doing these things and be like, ‘Man, cool. That’s so cool that they’re doing that. And that makes me want to do it, too.’”

Now that “ADAPTED” is up and running, Bikis, who lives in Tucson, Arizona, said the plan now is to take it on screening tours over the next two years. He’s also going to be busy behind the camera as well with his regular commercial work and starting a new documentary about conservation in southern Utah.

But first, it’s back to his old stomping grounds.

“We’re really excited to be going to the Durango Film Festival. It’s like the home theater. It’s like the home stage,” he said. “It’s coming back and being able to share it with friends and family and all the people that I think helped shape me into who that I am. And that feels really meaningful.”

katie@durangoherald.com