Banff

Banff, Film Festival, Film preview, Interview, Podcast / 07.01.2019

From the opening frames, a recent movie by Canadian adventure film maker Heather Mosher lets viewers know exactly what they’re in for. World class rock climber Kevin Jorgeson mugs at the camera and chuckles while his partner Jacob Cook holds up a bloody finger. This particular pitch on the Tom Egan Memorial Route in the Bugaboos of British Columbia was first climbed by Will Stanhope and Matt Segal back in 2015. Blood On The Crack is a pencil-thin fissure on a sheer vertical slab of granite. It’s the...

Banff, Books, Climbing, Film Festival, In Memoria, Interview / 17.03.2017

  On Tuesday March 14, 2017 climbing pioneer Royal Robbins died of natural causes at his home in Modesto California. He was 82 years old. A leader in the world of mountaineering he completed the first class VI climb in America on the Northwest Face of Yosemite’s Half Dome and in 1961 he completed an ascent of the Salathé Wall on El Capitan. In a long career that included the founding of a global sports apparel brand that bears his name Royal Robbins was a leader in the outdoor...

Adventure Media Review, Banff, Film Review, Podcast / 18.12.2015

[caption id="attachment_2063505" align="aligncenter" width="581"] Courtesy Sweetgrass Productions[/caption] From the opening  frames of the latest film by Sweetgrass Productions the monumental scale of the subject fills the screen. In concert with vocals and orchestra the images swell with the music in pace with the magnitude of a very controversial issue and the mountain wilderness which surrounds it. Never one to shy from the dramatic filmmaker Nick Waggoner sets the stage with meticulous care, like the conductor of a great opera. At the heart of this wonderful documentary is the age-old...

Adventure Media Review, Banff, Film Festival, Film preview, Interview, Paragliding, Skiing / 30.01.2015

Red Bull Air Force athlete Jon DeVore is riding high on the momentum of an emerging adventure sport. Combining his love of big mountain skiing and skydiving he and his teammates are putting themselves into some of the most inaccessible or inescapable terrain on the planet. Riding steep-angle lines on skis through hard to reach places with the help of a paraglider he’s on the cutting edge between two worlds. In his new film out this month at Red Bull On-Demand, DeVore pushes the boundaries of skiing beyond...

Banff, Climbing, Cycling, Deserts, Film Festival, Film Review / 05.12.2014

Audiences at the 2014 Banff Mountain Film Festival cheered loudest for a short feature that was nothing short of painful. SufferFest 2: Desert Alpine starring climbers Cedar Wright and Alex Honnold pulled off a stunning victory to win the Radical Reels People’s Choice Award. By pegging the needle on the ol’ Applause-o-Meter they earned another coveted spot on BMFF World Tour and the enthusiastic delight of an inspired crowd. SufferFest 2 is now available for download at Vimeo-on-Demand. The second in a series of hilarious adventure films produced and...

Adventure Media Review, Banff, Film Festival / 25.11.2014

A stand out attendee of the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival for the past 14 years, Jim Head can always we be counted on to ask a question. At each of the live speaking presentations during the nine-day program he’s the one person in the audience ready to take the microphone and demonstrate to the person on stage that he was listening and paying attention to their every word. Though some suspected that he was planted in the crowd by the festival organizers to get the conversation...