Alberta Number One is an immensely enjoyable film, capturing the adventures of a film crew exploring the museums, monuments, and roadside attractions of Canada, striving to find the truth together.
The yet “Untitled Museum Project” is directed by Professor Vanessa Wright and soon-to-be-mother Clare Andrews. “You’re gonna learn pretty quickly we’re not always interested in doing what’s right or what’s good,” Vanessa tells Naomi, an open faced intern on the project.
Traveling with them are Richard Awasa on camera, Jerry Schumann on sound, and Bobby as a production assistant. The landmarks they visit are eclectic as the music, ranging from miniatures to taxidermied gophers to wartime history to the biggest oil lamp in the world. In the words of Richard, offering a fist bump of encouragement to Bobby, “It’s like an acid trip… Just go with the flow and drink lots of water.”
The film crew is headed by Vanessa, whose aim is observing the landscape of museums as a cultural authority, their role in the post-COVID era and how they perpetuate or challenge inequality. As a national research chair, Vanessa has the most recognized role, the pull of funding, the most security—as Clare puts it to Naomi, if the film doesnt work out, Vanessa will create another celebrated book on the perils of autoethnography and ‘you and me will get jobs in restaurants’.
The power relations in the crew are interesting in this way, because all seem to have a simultaneous pull to the project, and a hesitance to commit to it. Being thrust together, away from home and family, the goal they are pursuing is unclear, yet somehow important. The crew are a mystery to each other, and we become more familiar with their backstories as they open up.
What is unsaid in the tours of museums indicates the audience in responsibility. At times pacifying, at times questioning, the movement of the crew through each landmark demands some resolution.
The team witnesses how the people of Alberta, Canada interact with their home’s places of importance—narrating how one middle aged man, “a single man who woke up with the intention to improve himself”, could be anywhere else, but instead he’s here, looking at the exhibits, reading the plaques. Looking for company, a lover? Maybe with a family at home?
At Big Valley Creation Science Museum, the guide references the exhibits, offering an alternative to the theories of evolution, as “a faith builder. This is proof that God exists.”
They converse with him about aliens and Darwin’s finches, and morality prevailing over survival of the fittest, if the world is made of God’s love. “There’s more to the creation story than most people think. It’s just not a 15-minute thing. Each of these is a half hour to 45 min lecture… so to do these in 15 minutes isn’t fair.”
Though with differing dispositions, the team shares a curiosity about the people and experiences of Alberta, a sincerity of connection.
On the road, they frequently encounter one motorcycling group with a trumpet player, and once a truck of people toting “Jesus Make Canada Great Again” memorabilia. They visit the Reynolds Aviation Display Hangar and the Cave and Basin National Historic Site. They play Alberta #1 Bingo on scratch off cards in a laundromat. Naomi asks Safari: “does gambling count as a sin?”
The overall rhythm is off kilter, with some dramatic beats missing the mark. But the pacing somehow fits the alternative style of Alberta. To make the film sound more interesting to one passerby, Clare describes it being “about the pain of being alone and the impossibility of being together.” This captures some of the poignant poetry in this endearing film. As the journey wraps up, Alberta Number One becomes about the film crew’s patchwork familial dynamic. The point is there is no point. A sweet, heartwarming and poignant road trip movie questioning art, togetherness, and the responsibility of our collective cultural imagination, with layers of emotion and connection unveiling on the ride.
Alberta Number One will be opening the Fall 2025 New Jersey Film Festival on Friday, September 5. The film will be Online for 24 Hours and In-Person at 7 PM in Voorhees Hall #105/Rutgers University, 71 Hamilton Street, New Brunswick, NJ. Director Sandy Carson and lead actor Liz Peterson will be on hand to do a Q+A with the in-person audience!
Tickets are available for purchase here.
The 44th Bi-Annual New Jersey Film Festival will be taking place between September 5-October 10, 2025. The Festival will be a hybrid as we will be presenting it online as well as doing select in-person screenings at Rutgers University. All the films will be available virtually via Video on Demand for 24 hours on their show date. VoD start times are at 12 Midnight Eastern USA. Each General Admission Ticket or Festival Pass purchased is good for both the virtual and the in-person screenings. Plus, we are very proud to announce that acclaimed band Cold Weather Company will be doing an audio-visual concert on Friday, October 10 at 7PM. Lastly, we will be offering three FREE Filmmaking Workshops! The in-person screenings and the Cold Weather Company concert will be held in Voorhees Hall #105/Rutgers University, 71 Hamilton Street, New Brunswick, NJ beginning at 1PM, 5PM or 7PM on their show date. General Admission Ticket=$15 Per Program; Festival All Access Pass=$120; In-Person Only Student Ticket=$10 Per Program. The Filmmaking Workshops are FREE and open to the public but have limited seating and require advance registration. To register email us at [email protected]
For more info go here: https://newjerseyfilmfestivalfall2025.eventive.org/welcome
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