Bozeman's October: A First Film Festival Arrives as Two Old Gathering Places Say Goodbye

A little girl walked into Joe's Parkway Market with her father not long ago, started sobbing, and had to go sit in the car. Her father later explained to owner Tara Wantulok that his daughter couldn't stand to be in the store now that it was closing.

Joe's has been on College Street since 1969. Its last day is set for sometime in early October. A few blocks north, Wild Joe*s Coffee Spot has said that after 25 years its lease at 18 W. Main Street will be "involuntarily terminated." Another business is already lined up for the space. In the same weeks, the Bozeman Film Society is putting on its first Bozeman Film Festival downtown.

The festival is the more useful story for anyone sorry to see the other two go. The Film Society lost both of its Main Street theaters in 2004. It kept its audience anyway, and next month that audience fills three downtown venues for four days. In Bozeman, a gathering place has outlived its building when the people who used it went looking for the next room. This October shows both sides of that at once.

Two rooms closing on one calendar

Joe's Parkway Market sits at 903 W. College St., across from Montana State. Over the years it served the historic south-side neighborhoods and the MSU students and faculty across the street. It was known for hard-to-find cheeses, meats and sauces, its seasoned prime rib, its wine selection, charcuterie boards and holiday gift baskets. KBZK reported the closing on Aug. 27, 2026.

Wantulok started at Joe's in 1998 as a college job. She later married Tyler Wantulok, grandson of Joe, the founder the store is named for. She told the Chronicle the reasons were concrete. A rising cost of living made it hard to keep employees. Grocery goods cost more. The margins were thin, and the building is 70 years old. Most visits to a boutique grocer like Joe's are a handful of items, while larger competitors drive prices down on volume. "I don't blame people for shopping at other places," she said.

Wild Joe*s is closing for a different reason. Owner Erica Brubaker isn't retiring the business. She is looking for a new space and has asked anyone with a lead to email her at [email protected]. Her letter to customers puts the stakes plainly.

"These community gathering places must continue to exist."

The shop is known for serving many locally roasted coffees. Its kitchen makes breakfast burritos, paninis, soups and baked goods, along with items from other Bozeman businesses. Brubaker describes the daily regulars as baristas, students, professionals, families and retirees.

The festival is a habit that already lost its room once

The Film Society's history explains why its new festival matters this October. According to its own account in the Chronicle, the organization has lost its home more than once and kept its audience each time.

1. 1970s. Jack Stonnell, a young MSU film and TV professor, starts monthly classic and world cinema screenings on campus. So many people from town show up that in 1978 the screenings move to the Ellen Theatre.
2. 1983. Downtown business owners and MSU faculty incorporate a nonprofit called Bozeman Film Festival, Inc. The board later makes the Rialto its home. Local film booker Verl Clark helps persuade a theater chain in Atlanta to send arthouse titles to Bozeman every week.
3. 2004. Both Main Street theaters close.
4. 2006. The group moves to the Emerson Crawford Theater and installs the Ellen's old 35mm projector. It later renames itself the Bozeman Film Society so people stop expecting a festival.
5. 2016. A community fundraising campaign called "Go Digital or Go Dark" pays for a digital projector, and screenings return to Main Street at the restored Ellen.

"Every screening since has run on a projector Bozeman bought," the Chronicle piece notes. This inaugural festival compresses that same habit into four days, in a town that has grown big enough to fill them.

Four days at the Ellen, the Rialto and the Armory

The festival runs Thursday, Oct. 8, through Sunday, Oct. 11. Screenings are at the Ellen Theatre, the Rialto and the Armory Tune Up. One downtown event listing shows Oct. 12 as the last day. The festival's own program and the Chronicle both give Oct. 8–11.

There are 72 films, a mix of short-film blocks and feature-length programs covering documentary, narrative and some animation. Opening night is Baby Love at the Ellen at 6:30 p.m. It follows an MMA fighter, sidelined by concussions, who reluctantly starts equine therapy. At 8:30 p.m., a kick-off celebration with the Craig Hall Trio follows at the Baxter. The party ticket includes a drink token and late-night appetizers.

Two titles stand out for anyone who knows this part of Montana. Hard Twist: Through the Lens of Barbara Van Cleve is a documentary about ranch life as seen through the work of the Montana photographer. One Plant looks at how a single plant connects to some of today's most pressing issues. The Chronicle describes these two and Baby Love as premieres "with deep Montana roots."

Two blocks are reserved for student filmmakers. One is a high school shorts program supported by Montana PBS Media Mavericks, and the other shows college work. Both play on the same screens as the rest of the lineup. Programming director Lincoln Sevier also pointed to The Row, a feature documentary about homelessness in Los Angeles. He said it left him "overwhelmed by the filmmaker's compassion" rather than saddened.

The Gallatin Pass covers every film for $150. A student pass is $50 and includes six films plus all panels. Single general-admission tickets and party tickets are sold separately.

The rest of October, in order

The festival falls in the busiest stretch of the month. It overlaps the Fall MADE fair and National Fossil Day on the same weekend. Oct. 30 has three events back to back.

Two summer markets have already ended for the year. The Bozeman Farmers Market at Lindley Park closed its season on Sept. 8. The Gallatin Valley Farmers' Market held its last regular Saturday on Sept. 12. Its next market is the Holiday Edition at the Gallatin County Fairgrounds on Nov. 28, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. That gap leaves College Street with no market of its own this fall, in the same weeks Joe's empties its shelves.

What comes next at 903 W. College and 18 W. Main

The Wantuloks sold the land, building and business to Todd Waller, founder of Venture West Development. Waller studied at MSU in the late 1990s and says he shops at Joe's all the time. He plans to renovate the building and add commercial space for more retailers. His first priority is a local business that serves the neighborhood and the university. "I'd sure love to get another market in there, and I'm in some conversations right now," he told the Chronicle, describing "the next generation" of Joe's. If no local vendor works out, he said he would look for a regional market that fits. No tenant has been named.

Some longtime customers aren't sure. Anthony Tangaro has shopped at Joe's since arriving as an MSU freshman in 1984. "Call me a cynic: I don't think it will be a grocery store," he said. Wantulok's own view takes in the whole block. She said the three-block College Street business strip "needs a little bit of love." She also said she believes in the current and future business owners, the neighborhood and the MSU community to keep it alive.

Wild Joe*s has more time on the calendar. Its "last hurrah" at 18 W. Main is Saturday, Dec. 5, during the 46th Annual Christmas Stroll, which runs from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m. that evening. Brubaker is putting together a memory window for December and is collecting customers' stories for it at the same email address. The open question is whether someone in town has the next room.

When a property has anchored a community for decades, selling it involves the same question Waller is working through on College Street: what role should the place keep after it changes hands? Stacie Wells brings that kind of stewardship to Montana ranches and large-acreage properties, where a family's history is part of what's being sold. If you're thinking about what your land's next chapter might look like, Request a Confidential Valuation.