The 5Point Film Festival began with a high-energy celebration of adventure culture. Awards for the 5Point Dream Project highlighted the opening evening with a program of nine short movies hosted by the outdoor industry’s favorite MC Timmy O’Neil.
Just how do you loose a river? In his new film “Chasing Water” National Geographic Photographer Peter McBride follows the course of the Colorado only to see it disappear. As much as we might get ourselves lost in the details of the science behind this frightening phenomenon, McBride allows us to make a personal connection with a rapidly depleting natural resource, fresh water.
The 5Point Film Festival opens its fourth season this weekend in Carbondale Colorado. Organizers are sprucing up the mountain town to welcome movie buffs from across the country to share in the latest creations of aspiring filmmakers, stories and images that celebrate the active lifestyle.
The adventure media genre is on the raise with more films, music, art and literature to pick from than ever before. Available on YouTube, Vimeo, Facebook, production house web sites and even network television, these days fans of outdoor action flicks can easily get their adrenalin fix of inspiration. But what makes for a quality viewing experience isn’t necessarily the vehicle you choose to watch. With your ass creasing the couch cushions downloads off your laptop or iPad2 will never be as exciting as a gathering of friends and like-minded strangers who share your passion for the outdoors and pushing the limits of the human experience. When it comes to true adventure media it’s all about the venue.
In a town with only one stop sign, one hotel and a three room bed & breakfast for lodging Carbondale is creating an intimate viewing space to tap the core energy of adventure culture. And just as I’m heading out to catch the show I connected with 5Point program director Beda Calhoun to get the inside scoop on what makes this festival a truly unique experience.
Yosemite Valley California, president day: I’m walking with my recorder along a wooded path with a long bearded man wearing period clothing circa 1890, a tweed coat, a wool vest with a red pocket square and wide brimmed hat. Ahead of us is Yosemite Falls, a massive flowage of water running white and fast, churning with melted snow from the high country upstream. The man describes a fanciful vision of what we see.
"Can you imagine? Can you imagine if in the midst of its headlong descent with all this whirling fairy springtime spray and those rushing comet tails that the fall was suddenly frozen solid and then carried bodily out into the middle of the valley that we might go around it and see it from all sides in the sunshine,” he says. “Oh was a show it would make. This colossal white pillar half a mile tall adorned with airy flowing drapery as if chiseled out of white marble.”
Who better with whom to tour one of America’s greatest National Parks than the man himself John Muir. As if transported back in time I had the rare opportunity to get his impressions on Yosemite today.
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