https://youtu.be/uN-pC5rxjMg (dubbed Italian)
I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this film and it did not take me long to get pretty involved in it. Snowboarding is not my ‘thing’ and that particularly world can be a significant dramatic turn-off but here there were quite rich and interesting characters. There were rather too many generic, albeit spectacular aerial and vertiginous shots of boarders hurtling down mountains which went on too long but once the story proper kicked in, all such scenes were much more effectively dramatically integrated into the, really pretty gripping, story.
There was good character development and relationships and the balance between this, the dramatic plot and the scenery with snowboarding (in and around Gstaad) made for a highly enjoyable balance. The love affair with Ethel was nicely charted and both the main characters, alpha males but tormented both had character aspects that one could empathise and sympathise with - not always a feature of sports-based films such as these. Once the boarding footage was fully integrated into the story it was genuinely thrilling. And G’s breakdown when he realised how he was going to be used by his hero was very powerful and imaginatively filmed.
Not a great film but one that I enjoyed watching and did not feel at the end that I had wasted an hour and a half of my life.