Skip to content

Cookies 🍪

This site uses cookies that need consent.

Learn more

Zur Powderguide-Startseite Zur Powderguide-Startseite

Language selection

Search PowderGuide

movies

Movie review | TGR Far Out

The great (un)known

by Lars Oelmann • 10/29/2018
The new TGR film attracted a lot of criticism and jokes in the run-up, as they had ventured quite far out (ha!) with the trailer to present us with the great unknown on film. For all those who feared that it would be the next celluloid joke a lá Onekotan, rest assured, it's a normal ski movie.

To all the critics who say that Albania isn't that remote and that they've been there on their bus to go skiing, let me tell you: the places haven't really been discovered until an American has been there with a film crew. I've also had the feeling at one time or another that if a rowhouse-dwelling fun skier like me has ever been there, it can't be very far from the Far Out. Whether it's Girdwood in AK or the Italian Eastern Alps, there are places that are much whiter patches on the map than the locations in this TGR flick.

The movie is essentially built around the big TGR Albania trip, which serves as a far-out bracket that holds the movie together. The first sequences and film segments are aesthetically unusual. The dream-like sequences in the intro and the first film segments as well as the partly psychedelic music stand out pleasantly from other ski film intros. There is something stylistically daring here and the eye is not bored.

Later on, however, the whole thing becomes rather conventional and sticks to familiar ski movie sequences. People camp in the mountains, people travel to unknown places. So far, so good.

The voiceover explains the far-out Albania to us step by step, and a pleasing female voice proclaims the wisdom of Instagram travel explorers. This is probably necessary in the age of the search for #authenticity and doesn't really bother us, but it always has a stale aftertaste. Drones have now been an integral part of ski films for 2-3 years as a "poor man's helicam", but a tent remains a tent even if it was filmed with a drone.

If you thought super slow-motion shots and hyperlapses died of an overdose sometime in the early 2010s ski films, you'll be proven wrong here. 7.3K coffee drops pearl in super slow motion and 8.4 trillion colors in expedition cups and hyperlapses with the "memories" of the athletes attack our televisions directly from the brains of skiers and snowboarders.

On the plus side, the snowboard scene is once again represented in large numbers and is pleasantly embedded in the film flow. Various followcam shots are well worth seeing thanks to the gyro stabilization.

Musically, the whole thing is tailored to white old men like me and the various guitars saw sometimes modern and beat-heavy, sometimes classic. I thought the soundtrack was great, but that's certainly a matter of taste.

The skiing is at a high level, but it lacks that decisive "aha" moment that really gets you going. The lack of typical Alaska sequences is noticeable, as it was apparently a terribly bad year up there. What I do appreciate, however, is the absence of the repetitive BC ski lodge pillow segments, where a crew of illustrious pros show us how to hop pillows and spin 3s in a blizzard.

Sometimes the pros struggle with problems that have been with us mere mortals for years and years, skiing sometimes more, sometimes less good snow. The Jeremy Jones segment somehow comes across as B-grade of his own productions and you have to ask why one of the TGR owners has to dedicate a 5-minute segment to his son? But since this is nice to watch as an age-mild family man, it's not as much of a thrill as an urban jib segment with no sticks and open hipster shirts in Kamchatka. #WTF?

Am I too old or just not stupid enough to think this is a good idea?

Conclusion

All in all, you can say: you can watch it, but you don't have to. Far Out gets 6/10 expedition points on PowderGuide's completely subjective oracle scale.

Trailer

This article has been automatically translated by DeepL with subsequent editing. If you notice any spelling or grammatical errors or if the translation has lost its meaning, please write an e-mail to the editors.

Show original (German)

Related articles

Comments