Oct 27, 2006

It’s Ski-Snowboard Film Time

"Ski films," my good friend Jules has been known to say, "are like porn. They initially grab your interest, but after fifteen minutes of watching the same thing over and over, you get bored."

I don’t know if I totally agree with Jules, but I’ll say this. Ski and snowboard films can be infantile, repetitive and self-indulgent (the next skier/rider who sticks his tongue out at the camera or twists his face should definitely be punched), but when it’s October and there’s finally a nip in the air, a snowsliding addict will watch just about anything to get his/her fix.

Each autumn we’re blitzed with ski/ride films, and have been so since Warren Miller initiated the form 54 years ago. The question is this: how much, if any, of this stuff do we actually need?

Once upon a time, I was a judge at the International Ski Film & Video Festival that was staged at Crested Butte Mountain Resort. I was always assigned to the "action films" category.

What this meant was that I had to sit through five films in a row depicting skiers and snowboarders hucking off ridiculous cliffs and through neck-deep powder in exotic locales. I was to judge each according to a variety of criteria on a numerical scale.

That took about seven or eight hours.

Then I skied for two days at The Butte’s expense, usually on their supreme extreme terrain.

The point is this: after I watched those films, I was indeed bleary-eyed and a touch numb from the repetitiveness of it all. But, under their influence, I also skied like an inspired madman.

So, now it’s ski/ride film season. A colleague from SnowboardSecrets.com is hosting a showing of the new film Anomaly by Teton Gravity Research on November 9 in Fairfield, Connecticut. Off the Grid, Warren Miller Films’ new production, is playing nationwide. And those comprise just the tip of the iceberg.

But, what good does watching such films do if you’re stuck in the northeast’s suburbs and it’s only October? What does it mean? In the end, I guess, it means that if you’re truly snow addicted, you’ll get your fix no matter what the place or time of year.

Related Article: New Warren Miller Ski Film Debuts