 |
| Kadoma, about kayaking in Africa, is one of several shorts making the rounds this season. Courtesy, Banff Centre |
Around the world in 15 films
Stunning footage unites diverse Banff screenings
By Eric Volmers,
Calgary Herald
January 16, 2012
Thirty years ago, getting that vicarious rush from watching films about mountain culture was a more onerous affair.
In fact, when Mike Mortimer began overseeing the Banff Mountain Film Festival’s early outreach program into Calgary, the films themselves were bulky, heavy and not particularly fun to cart around.
“We had to have them cleaned, the Alberta censor would have to see them. . . . It used to be a nightmare,” says Mortimer, who is the host for the film festival world tour’s Calgary stop today to Jan. 22, at the Rozsa Centre. “I remember one time in Banff a fight almost erupted between a filmmaker and a technician. It had magnetic tape or something and the sound wasn’t working.”
DVDs now make organizing these viewings a much easier process. But technology has also helped out on the ground floor, or mountainside as the case may be.
In the 1970s and early 1980s when the Banff Mountain Film Festival started, documentaries about mountain climbing, kayaking and exploration were far more formal. Now, lightweight cameras allow even the greenest of filmmaker to capture spectacular footage and present it in a decidedly in-your-face manner.
No comments:
Post a Comment