Once I Was a Champion

(USA, 2011, 93 mins)

World Premiere

Executive Producers: Sophia Tavernakis, Dan Caldwell
Producer: Kirk Porter
Cinematographer: Matt Irwin
Editor: Gerard Roxburgh
Featuring: Evan Tanner, Randy Couture, Dana White, John Herzfeld , Forrest Griffin, Chael Sonnen, Rich Franklin

In 2008, Ultimate Fighting Championship star Evan Tanner went on a solo trip to the desert. Several days later his body was found less than a mile from his campsite. A complex man and an anomaly in the world of mixed martial arts, Tanner was a self-taught philosopher with conflicted feelings about fighting and a self-described loner who motivated thousands with his writing.

Combining archival footage and interviews with those closest to Tanner, director (and former fighter) Gerard Roxburgh sensitively paints a portrait of a man conflicted, a fighter who believed he could change the world even when he couldn’t change himself.

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