Erstellt am: 14. 1. 2014 - 14:14 Uhr
"Celebrating The Beauty Of The Mountains"
In a patch of heavy but untracked snow in the woods near the Streif piste in Kitzbühel, two friends were fumbling with a rope among the fir trees.
“Tie it higher; it needs to be more taut!” Julian Bodner bellowed down to Markus Wallinger, who was half obscured in the branches.
chris cummins
The two freeskiers, both locals, were part of a team called "Contains Powder" and were taking part in the film competition at the Kitzbühel Freeride Weeks. Five teams had 72 hours each to create a film lasting no longer than two and a half minutes.
Fortune and Glory
With a cash prize of 5,000 euros on offer, as well as a platform to demonstrate their skills and the dream of launching a career in the ski industry, team Contains Powder were desperate to create an innovative shot to set them apart from their rival teams.
chris cummins
This quest had taken the other two members of the team, Markus Gianmoena and Max Witzmann, up the mountain by foot at dawn to catch the sunrise on camera. Then Witzmann had strapped himself into a paraglider and filmed Markus from above. This budget equivalent of the helicopter shot continued with a filmed flight over the still white roof tops of the Tyrolean town.
The A-Team
Meanwhile, back in the woods Bodner and Wallinger were trying to set up a “rope camera” to get a moving sideways shot of Bodner skiing through the trees.
The preparations for the shot were hard work, with much wading up and down the steep slope in the thigh deep slope fiddling with the equipment and wrestling with the trees.
Working on a tiny budget, the pair had improvised by fixing a small helmet camera to the rope by a pulley-system that they had crafted from the casing of an old computer and parts of an ancient skateboard.
So we had a bit of action and a bit of creative handicraft: it felt like I was hanging out with the A-team.
Max Witzmann
All members of the team Contains Powder were still studying, so the cash prize was clearly a big attraction, but so was the chance to improve their filmmaking skills with professional director Allard Faas, who was advising the teams during a nightly workshop.
We’ve been skiing together for years,” says Markus, “and after a while we started trying to take pictures of each other skiing great lines. When the photography got boring we started making little videos and uploading them on YouTube. So we saw this competition and thought 'why not'?” They said they were looking forward to expert feedback.
Enthusiasm and Innovation
Faas, a bear-like man from Amsterdam, has made freeride films as well as commercial spots and feature-length documentaries but said he’d been inspired by what he had seen at the workshop.
“Watching the enthusiasm and the innovation of these guys, reminds me of why I fell in love with filmmaking in the first place,” he said, “Nowadays when I make films and I need a cable-camera, I hire one, but these make me want to go home and build one myself too!”
Markus Gianmoena
Ski Porn?
But what makes a good ski story? "It goes without saying", says Faas, viewers want spectacular and aesthetic action-shots, but if it is to be more than what the Dutchman calls "ski porn" Faas wants a narrative to drive on the action:
“What I would like to see is a film with a structure, with a beginning and end and some sort of story, so that as a viewer I can be taken along with the action.”
Getting The Right Story
As well as freeride movies, Faas makes feature length documentaries and he brings a broader view to what can often seem a niche film genre. “Freeriders always want to appear strong and without vulnerability. But the audience needs to identify with the riders." He says freeride filmmakers should be more prepared to show the hardships and pitfalls of the sport.
Creating empathy and character is not easy, particularly when the clip isn't allowed to last more than 150 seconds and where the riders are mostly wearing helmets.
Contains Powder team members decide to introduce themselves doing everyday work. They set up a sequence where one of them is driving and sees a distant peak and texts his friends, then they all throw down the tools and set off up the mountain.
Team Contains Powder
Charm and Comedy
An original take on the freeride movie genre was produced by Team English, produced rather shakily by Tama Jarman, a New Zealander novice to skiing. Drawn to the Freeride Weeks base, a plastic dome that looks like an alien's cocoon, he'd turned up at Faas' first workshop and decided spontaneously to create a team and enter the competition. The action maybe lacking but the charm and comedy are there in abundance.
"I don't have any plans, I don't have any ski gear, I don’t have a ski pass and I don't know how to ski," said Jarman. "The film is about me trying to get all these things sorted so I can make a ski film. It is about making a ski film rather than the skiing itself."
Back up the mountain, the rope-camera shot didn’t work out, partly because the snow turned out to be sluggish and slow to ride and unattractive on film. It was also partly because they left me in charge of letting the camera slide down the rope. I missed my cue and the camera missed Julian’s ride.
But undeterred, and with with me still in tow, team Contains Powder set off among the ridges of the Ehrenbachgrube ski area looking for some more lines. The search was tough: the unseasonably warm weather had left rocks and even tufts of grass exposed, and sheen of melt water glazed on the surface of sun-exposed snow.
Matthias Haunholder
Yet there is no pointing moaning in the freeride world. Nature calls the orders, and skiers can only obey them. There is always some decent snow somewhere; you just have to trek further for it.
The previous day team Contains Powder had hiked with skins over rocks to the Rossgrube Peak before abseiling down to the virgin snow below. Now, on this second day of shooting, the focus was on shooting close-ups and adding variety.
Platform for freeriding
The two week-long event is the brain child of freeride pros Matthias Haunholder und Matthias Mayr. “The idea is to create a platform for freeriding," said Haunholder. "The pros are here presenting their movies, riding with public and talking about what they are doing.” As well as the spectacular films there are also lectures on mountain safety.
Chris Cummins
The mountain calendar is crowded with freeride events this winter, but the Kitzbühel Freeride Weeks, which end this weekend, stand out because of the focus on the visual arts.
If you want to vote for a film you can here. I endorse none and all of them. Please vote fairly.
"Well that’s partly because Hauni and I come from that background. We make a lot of films, so it is our world,” says Matthias Mayr.
“But there’s another reason. I see freeriding as a combination of sport and art. It is about expressing yourself on the mountain. It’s not about seeing who can get down the mountain fastest, it’s about celebrating the beauty of the mountains and so a film and photo workshop fits like a glove."