A Piece of Snow Bum History Part 3

In our last post we promised a Ski Bum movie featuring the fluorescent 80’s ski suits we all fondly remember and here it is- Aspen Extreme.  Checking out the DVD cover we find many touchstones that indicate 80’s snow bum glory- from the yellow and pink snow suit, to the jarring neon yellow/blue/purple title, to the “Top Gun” reference, which is more prominent than the actual movie title.  Indeed, there are so many aspects of the 80’s in this poster that is might surprise you to find out that this movie came out in 1993.

As pointed out in How I Met Your Mother though, “The 80’s didn’t come to Canada until 1993” – and while this movie may be set in Colorado, it does feature everyone’s favourite Canadian actor- Paul Gross.  He’s the guy on the left wearing the aviators- if you don’t immediately recognize him, it might be because you’re more used to seeing him looking like this:

That’s right – before Due South, Men With Brooms, Slings & Arrows and waaaaay before Passchendaele Paul Gross was ski bum T.J. Burke. 

The plot of the movie involves T.J. and his friend Dexter who quit their jobs in Detroit to become ski-instructors in Aspen. While T.J. advances to the most popular instructor of the school during the season, he has to take care of Dexter, whose future is less bright and who is eventually thinking about jobbing as drug courier - bringing their friendship to a test. Meanwhile a rich businesswoman supports T.J. in his recently realized writing ambitions and invites him to live at her home; T.J. responds by falling for a blonde radio moderator.  Finally – as no one reading will be surprised to learn- the subplots come to a climax with (wait for it…) a ski contest!  Granted, this contest features considerably less punching than Hot Dogs.

Our favourite part of the film had to be the cinematography- this movie features the best scenic shots this side of a Warren Miller flick.  Even better, while the bowl skiing sequences were actually filmed in Colorado, apparently the mountains there weren’t “scenic” enough- so all those wide mountain shots were done here in big, beautiful British Columbia (or so the internet tells us.) 

Anyone wanting to experience the snow bum life here in BC has just less than 2 weeks to get his or her video entered!  So get filming Snow Bums!