To every yin there is a yang, and if your going to pick the antonym to sailing it would be skiing. Warn tropic wind and water is countered by chilled arctic blasts. Slow peaceful dances over the waves are countered by lightning fast lunges over frosty topped mogul fields. They are as opposite as you can get, except they are common cousins in the hearts of those who hold them dear. And Warren Miller proved to be the same sort as the rest of the summer sailors forced to abandon their love for the darker months. He just found more success with his films on the frozen side than he did on the liquid side and so that is why we are including his work in this top five best of series.
I was introduced to Miller's work when I was a attending school at UCONN in 1995. There was a new skiing film being premiered on campus and while I was a sailor at heart, skiing made more sense 100 miles from shore in the frozen hills of Connecticut. My girlfriend at the time was given tickets and I was "invited" to attend with her. Truth be told I went begrudgingly as I did everything in those days, preferring drinking in the dorms in lieu of pretty much anything else. But I went and I was enthralled with the style.
The sing songy narration over rapid shots of ruddy cheeked boys named Chad crashing down powder streaked mountains proved to me that there was a world outside of summer and he managed to bring me in to it despite my grunge era disenfranchisement.
It wasn't the super 8 grainy stuff of home movies which I was used to seeing in skiing and sailing pics, but instead was polished, crisp and professional looking. He made movies about skiing and not just videos. I never once saw his movies on the shelves at Blockbuster, let alone in\the mega movie plex but he became synonymous with skiing movies in way no one else ever seemed to capture that sport. I wonder how his work would have changed had he had the advantage of the internet while making and promoting his work.
And he was prolific. From 1946 when he got out of the military from serving in the Pacfic in WWII all the way up to 1988 when he filmed his last movie and passed the torch to a production company he founded, he made over 750 films and never once did they make Network TV.
This was a time before the Internet and YouTube, and to get a picture edited, let alone shared, required a small fortune and a singular vision to get the work done. How many times must he have said to himself, screw the picture lets go skiing or surfing as he was known to pursue when away from the slopes. But he created a body of work that was good and not just a bunch of video of him and his buddies thrashing out of bounds.
He also dabbled in sailing and water based fun seeking as is evidenced by this example I will use for the purpose of\ this blog post. It certainly does no justice to his full length works, but it gives you a feel for his narration and quick takes. A signature of his videography style.
The old man passed away in 2018 but left a legacy for us all to follow. You don't need to be a high budget production house with corporate sponsors to make good TV. With the technology we have today we can do so much more than what Miller did in the early days of his work. It was him, a van and a camera and he climbed the highest peaks to get his shot. It wasn't a story about him, but rather a story about the sport he loved. And that's what makes it great.
So many today are making videos about themselves and their adventures. Whether its in a van or a bus or boat, the self is always first in their respective stories. Miller, while he always put his signature narration in the film and often times made an extended cameo, the story was never about his adventure but about the viewers enjoyment of the story he was telling. And so we can learn a lot from this master of the \Mobile Lifestyle. This sultan of the slopes, this man before his time- because had Miller had the chance to do his work in the Google age- can you imagine what it would have looked like. Thanks for reading.
The sing songy narration over rapid shots of ruddy cheeked boys named Chad crashing down powder streaked mountains proved to me that there was a world outside of summer and he managed to bring me in to it despite my grunge era disenfranchisement.
It wasn't the super 8 grainy stuff of home movies which I was used to seeing in skiing and sailing pics, but instead was polished, crisp and professional looking. He made movies about skiing and not just videos. I never once saw his movies on the shelves at Blockbuster, let alone in\the mega movie plex but he became synonymous with skiing movies in way no one else ever seemed to capture that sport. I wonder how his work would have changed had he had the advantage of the internet while making and promoting his work.
And he was prolific. From 1946 when he got out of the military from serving in the Pacfic in WWII all the way up to 1988 when he filmed his last movie and passed the torch to a production company he founded, he made over 750 films and never once did they make Network TV.
This was a time before the Internet and YouTube, and to get a picture edited, let alone shared, required a small fortune and a singular vision to get the work done. How many times must he have said to himself, screw the picture lets go skiing or surfing as he was known to pursue when away from the slopes. But he created a body of work that was good and not just a bunch of video of him and his buddies thrashing out of bounds.
He also dabbled in sailing and water based fun seeking as is evidenced by this example I will use for the purpose of\ this blog post. It certainly does no justice to his full length works, but it gives you a feel for his narration and quick takes. A signature of his videography style.
The old man passed away in 2018 but left a legacy for us all to follow. You don't need to be a high budget production house with corporate sponsors to make good TV. With the technology we have today we can do so much more than what Miller did in the early days of his work. It was him, a van and a camera and he climbed the highest peaks to get his shot. It wasn't a story about him, but rather a story about the sport he loved. And that's what makes it great.
So many today are making videos about themselves and their adventures. Whether its in a van or a bus or boat, the self is always first in their respective stories. Miller, while he always put his signature narration in the film and often times made an extended cameo, the story was never about his adventure but about the viewers enjoyment of the story he was telling. And so we can learn a lot from this master of the \Mobile Lifestyle. This sultan of the slopes, this man before his time- because had Miller had the chance to do his work in the Google age- can you imagine what it would have looked like. Thanks for reading.
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