Movement as Medicine, Connection, and Freedom
Nathan Sill’23’s documentary “Afterglow” delves into the physical challenges, personal trauma, and the power of community that defined his parkour group’s journey.
As he began his senior year, Nathan Sill’23 — a psychology major, member of the swimming team, and parkour enthusiast — was not expecting to add ‘filmmaker’ to his resume. Then he took a leadership class with Tim Leslie’89. “It was one of my favorite classes,” says Sill, “[with] highly-motivated students and an inspiring environment.” The class reawakened his interest in filmmaking, and making a movie suddenly seemed possible.
One year later, the film he wrote, directed, and produced was accepted into the 2024 Beloit International Film Festival. There, “Afterglow” captivated audiences and received the Executive Director’s Award. “For our first film festival and my first film, to win this award was amazing,” Sill says.
Credit: Peer Canvas
The film, which Sill began during Leslie’s course, was initially envisioned as a parkour-based highlight reel, but it evolved into something much more. The final result is a feature-length documentary that follows five young men coming of age in Beloit and bonding over their shared passion for parkour — an activity that involves moving quickly and efficiently through urban or natural environments. Parkour athletes navigate obstacles by running, jumping, climbing, vaulting, rolling, and other acrobatics, using precision, creativity, and improvisation.
A Beloit native and superhero fan, Sill discovered parkour in high school when a friend showed him a video online. Seeing people leaping from building to building seemed like something out of a comic book, and he founded a parkour group with a few friends and classmates at Beloit Memorial High School. They called the group Sigfreed, in a nod to that heroic figure of Germanic and Norse literature. Like Siegfried, known for his strength and courage, the group sought to gain freedom from their fears by confronting them.
Credit: Alex Page
The inspiration for the film came from this group of friends, people Sill grew up with and that he met in college. “We found a story that we really loved because it was our story,” Sill explains, “and we realized that we were the only ones who could tell it.” In the film, the group traverses natural and urban landscapes, and confronts more than just physical obstacles. They also face and overcome serious injuries, difficult home lives, homelessness, addiction, and mental health issues, finding strength and support in each other and in their friendship. In the film, they each share how parkour, friendship, and movement in nature helped them overcome these challenges.
Sill brought Sigfreed with him to Beloit College, catching the attention of Max Saladar’23 and Ben Xiong’25, who joined the group. Sigfreed would jump across rooftops, climb everything that could possibly be climbed, and perform high-risk stunts on campus, in town, and further afield. “Beloit gave me the chance to explore and redefine who I wanted to be. I was shy and anxious starting college. Beloit taught me how to get out of my shell and pushed me into situations I wouldn’t have put myself into otherwise,” Sill says. “I wouldn’t have made this movie if I hadn’t gone to Beloit.”
Credit: Alex Page
Sill, an avid swimmer since childhood, joined the college swim team and soon faced one of his most difficult obstacles. During his first year, a relatively routine back surgery to repair two discs in his lower back resulted in a spinal injury that left him in a wheelchair, paralyzed from the waist down. The recovery, which coincided with the pandemic’s isolation, led to a struggle with opioid addiction. Through it all, his family, friends, and Sigfreed were there for him.
Remarkably, after seven months of grueling rehab, Sill was out of the wheelchair and using a walker. From there, he graduated to canes and leg braces. Against all expectations, he returned to the swim team his junior year, competing for the Buccaneers and clocking times close to his times from before the injury. At first, he wasn’t sure he wanted to tell this story in “Afterglow.” It became clear though in the filmmaking process that the story of trauma and recovery should be at the heart of the film. “Seeing how these traumatic experiences affected the group, how these experiences shape us as people and the people around us — that was a big part of learning how to tell the story,” Sill says.
Credit: Alex PageFor Sill, recounting his story and his friends’ stories was not easy, but ultimately was incredibly rewarding. “I’ve always valued the group and what it’s done for me. Even if you’re like family, you don’t always say how you feel to each other, so to have the opportunity to do that on film is really powerful.”
None of the team had much experience with filmmaking, and their equipment consisted of a GoPro and an iPhone. “I was working with people who were like family to me, so trying to make sure the story would be told well, that it was as genuine as possible, was really stressful,” Sill says. “I stayed up nights structuring and writing scenes.” He knew he wanted drone shots and found Alex Page, an up-and-coming videographer. Page, who is also an ultra-athlete and a vegan, like several members of Sigfreed, was a great fit. “Alex was more than able to keep up with us, running around with his camera and his gear,” Sill says.
After filming was complete, Sill’s friend Mason Sorenson’25, a studio art and psychology double major with years of experience editing YouTube videos, offered to help. They edited the film in Sorenson’s dorm room, working close to 1,000 hours on the project over three months, sometimes working all night and up to 14 hours at a time to ensure it would be ready to premiere for the Beloit community. Sorenson says that editing almost 30 hours of footage into an 80-minute film was challenging, but also fun, and he enjoyed working with Sill. “We think about the world and life in a similar way, and were able to bring his vision to life because of that.”
Sill wants to continue to spread the message from the film that people should lift each other up, that we are not alone. “I’m happy that people love the movie and love the people in the movie as much as I do,” Sill says. He is submitting “Afterglow” to more film festivals. He and his team also hope to bring the movie to other colleges, and are looking for distribution opportunities and organizations to work with for screenings. Meanwhile, they are working on a website and learning the business side of the industry. Sill continues to develop his filmmaking skills, using the group’s YouTube channel, Sigfreed Explore, as a place to experiment and as an archive. “I want to focus on human stories,” he says, “stories that show how connection and freedom can help us get to better places.”
