"We had over a thousand people in the theatre (hey, we're halfway to my goal of filling it since a TCU Place staffer tells me it holds 2000). The audience comprised our usual mix of about 1/2 university/college students, with the balance a more or less even mix of young and mature adults along with families (not that many kids, but enough to know it's still popular with family groups).
This year a number of films featured somewhat different subject matter than we've seen previously, aimed more toward adventure. This is a direction the Banff Centre staff tell me they have been heading with the festival film parameters to broaden the film experience for audiences; they're including films that follow the spirit of the festival without necessarily being set or focused on mountains, and this year added an award category (Adventure or Exploration) to reflect that. One of them was Crossing the Ditch, at 55 minutes our longest film, an involving story of two young men who decided to cross between Australia and New Zealand in a custom built sea kayak. They started with no background or knowledge of kayaking, just a drive for adventure, and the film followed their efforts as well as the family dynamics. It was a hit at Banff, and equally so here in Saskatoon.
The subject of caving was covered in the shorter film Into Darkness. This was some serious caving, with dramatic shots of the cave interiors. A number of the audience were doing some real squirming right along with the cavers in some places in the film where their route was tight.
One of the mountain-themed films, The Swiss Machine, followed Swiss climber Ueli Steck who, to quote the film description on the tourhost site, "tells of his record-breaking ascents in the Alps, accompanied by stunning aerial footage that captures him racing up 2500-metre alpine faces." Our audience certainly enjoyed this one, and I can attest to the impact of both the sweeping photography of the mountain peaks and the intensity of the action (they filmed him speed climbing The Eiger, in 2 hours 47 minutes).
Our sponsors were out in full in the display area, with some great equipment there for people to see and touch. Along with the usual gear displayed, Escape Sports featured a paddle board and slow sled, Eb's had a bright red kayak (I think whitewater, but I don't know enough about them to be sure) propped up against a pillar, and Bike Doctor brought in three bikes, one with innovative fat snow tires that had everyone gathered round for a look-see. All the usual sponsors had table displays, and there was one again from Parks Canada who is one of the major film festival sponsors for the second year now. CPAWs was there this year, as well as a local Kayaking Club who will likely become full sponsors next year. In fact, I expect that next year we'll have to reconfigure the display area to make more room for set up, and they certainly are a hit with the audience who made good use of the pre-film and intermission time to circulate--the place was packed.
The venue is a hit, too, and given our numbers we had people up in the balconies this year again. Here are the 10 films they saw (although not necessarily in this order):
- Rush Hour Dream (paragliding)
- Into Darkness (caving)
- Crossing the Ditch (sea kayak adventure)
- Swiss Machine (alpine climbing)
- Kranked (humourous kids mountain biking)
- Life Cycles (an exploration of off-road cycling)
- Chimaera (photographic perspective on skiing)
- Stones Into Schools (mountain culture and humanitarian work in Afghanistan)
- Still Motion (wildlife environment)
- Dream Result (whitewater kayaking)
An excellent evening. Many thanks to our local sponsors and to everyone on the crew who worked to make this evening a success. We'll be back next year.
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