Jackson, Wyoming – January 15, 2008 – The Alpinist Film Festival announced today that legendary filmmaker Dana Brown will present his film Step Into Liquid–called by Rolling Stone magazine “the best surfing documentary ever made”–at a special 2 p.m. matinee screening on Friday, January 18th, at the Walk Festival Hall in Teton Village, WY. There will be a $5 suggested donation at the door, the proceeds of which will be donated to the 2008 AFF’s featured non-profit, SurfAid International.
Step Into Liquid, the highest-grossing surf film in history, is a hypnotic and spectacular documentary that articulates the depths of surfing obsessions. In the film, Dana Brown leads the viewer from world-famous surf breaks like Bonzaii Pipeline, HI, to places completely unassociated with surfing, like Galveston, Texas, and Sheboygan, WI, where people are nevertheless proud of their home break.
Upon the conclusion of the matinee, the doors to the Walk Festival Hall will open to The Alpinist Film Festival’s Surf Night. That evening, Brown and his son Wes–who, with “Grandpa” Bruce Brown, comprise three generations of Brown filmmakers–will trace the evolution of both surfing itself and their family’s lensmanship with a showcase of their most spectacular and influential surf scenes from films such as Endless Summer, Endless Summer II and Chasing Dora, Wes’ 2006 film. Chasing Dora won Grand Prize at the 2007 AFF.
AFF film coordinator Conor Miller said of Step Into Liquid, “Because it’s so unique and encompasses such a wide variety of stories and backgrounds, it’s one of the few films you can watch over and over. Even if you’ve seen it before, you should see it presented live by Dana–it takes multiple viewings to get the full effect. Plus, when will you get to see Dana present it again?”
The $5 suggested donation will benefit the 2008 Alpinist Film Festival’s featured non-profit: SurfAid international, a non-profit organization dedicated to the alleviation of human suffering in Indonesia’s Mentawai Islands. Money will be raised for SurfAid International through silent auctions held throughout the three nights of the AFF, and with Friday and Sunday’s 2 p.m. matinees.
The 2008 Alpinist Film Festival will feature its signature Snow, Surf and Stone nights January 17-19 at Walk Festival Hall in Teton Village, Wyoming. A fourth evening, The People’s Choice Ceremonies, will present the People’s Choice award-winning films from the previous three evenings at the Center for the Arts in downtown Jackson. Winners of the individual evenings receive a gift certificate from Patagonia worth $750. The Grand Prize winner receives an additional gift certificate worth $1,500.
Tickets for The 2008 Alpinist Film Festival are $18 for the Snow, Surf and Stone nights and $20 for the People’s Choice Ceremonies. Tickets and additional information can be found online at www.alpinist.com/film_festival. To date, every event in The Alpinist Film Festival’s three-year history has sold out.
About The Alpinist Film Festival
The Alpinist Film Festival celebrates the adventure lifestyle across disciplines and generations with three nights of film in skiing, surfing and climbing. The Festival’s mission is to advance the art of cinematographic storytelling as it underscores the unity among the adventure lifestyle communities. A portion of every year’s proceeds are donated to charities that help preserve the places of our inspiration. Because one of these places is our planet, beginning in 2008, the Festival will purchase carbon offsets to counteract its carbon footprint.
About Alpinist Magazine
Hailed by Italian climbing legend Reinhold Messner as “The best climbing magazine in the world today,” Alpinist Magazine is an archival-quality, quarterly publication dedicated to world alpinism and adventure climbing. The pages of Alpinist capture the art of ascent in its most powerful manifestations, presenting an articulation of climbing and its lifestyle that matches the intensity of the pursuit itself. Alpinist has been awarded three Maggie Awards, for Best Quarterly/Consumer Division, Best Overall Design, and Best Electronic Newsletter, and was featured in a seven-page article in Outside Magazine (“The Purists”) in March 2005. The magazine’s editorial and publishing offices are based in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and online at www.alpinist.com.