It’s 1 AM, I may not be sober, but I feel I need to write this.

Tonight, I went to the Level1 Premiere. It was everything that TGR wishes it could be when it comes to a premiere for skiing. TGR was a clean-cut, crisp, sponsored, well-monetized film. Yes, Kai Jones, can ski. Yes, they had wonderful slo-mo pow shots. Sage and Ian Macintosh at age 42 and 38 respectively had the most impressive lines in that film skiing big mountain in Alaska. I love both of them as skiers. They have progressed the sport in ways most skiers our age can only dream of, and almost assuredly will never accomplish. What TGR lacked was new blood pushing the sport(Minus Kai Jones, Kai is moving things along well). Level1’s premiere in SLC did not leave me wanting.

Level1 brought the most amazing, new, progressive movies I could ever have imagined to a small, standing-room-only clubhouse and it was glorious. In the beginning, people were cheering, letting the athletes know that their hard work was appreciated and that we loved where skiing was right now. The highlight of the night was undoubtedly the Forre film. I won’t go into detail, but let me just say that in any format of skiing, Forre takes the cake for the most progressive, incredible crew I have ever seen.

However, as the night went on, people became restless. I get it. We’re all standing there in a hot room where every now and then, someone rips a big smelly fart, but still, show some damn respect. The Bunch made what I found to be their most progressive movie in terms of different skiing(big mountain) cinematography, and beautiful music. And it was clear in the room that people weren’t watching it. I wanted to listen intently and watch as this beautiful film played out as the closer to an amazing event. I appreciated the incredible shots The Bunch put up in a film they clearly poured their soul into, and all the while I could only hear the background noise of people talking.

I’ve never been a huge fan of the bunch, To be honest, it spans back to when I was kind of peeved that Magnus took Gold in Xgames Realski from LJ Strenio back in 2017. LJ deserved that Gold and I’ll still stand by it that he does. That’s ancient history now. The Bunch has been putting out beautiful movies that show the heart of freeskiing for what it is since I don’t know how long now.

I may be 25 years old now, but I don’t feel like the old curmudgeon just yet. I just care about skiing and being polite enough to the point where even if I thought the most awful, terrible film was being shown at a premiere, I’d still shut up and watch. These skiers pour their heart and soul into these films, and if you really care about what they do, they deserve your attention. The Bunch clearly wanted to do something new, and cool with their latest film, and the premiere at SLC tonight had me wanting to punch some people in the mouth to get them to shut up. Not sure there’s a moral here, but I was just mighty pissed that the Bunch clearly had put a lot into a new movie with new skiing that differed from what they had done previously, and I could barely hear what they were saying, or putting on as music since most of the crowd just kept talking. Anyhow, If you’re at a premiere, have fun, get drunk, do whatever, but don’t be one of those people who ignores what’s up on the screen to jabber and miss the point of the event. Call me old, call me out of touch, whatever you want, but I stand by what I say, Skiers who make amazing films and make premieres possible deserve to have their films watched, not ignored at said premieres.

I doubt it was anyone on this website ignoring a ski movie at a ski premiere, but I'm less than sober and pissed about what I saw at the premiere so here I am writing this up.

TTFN

-Bigpurp