Ahh, the Classics

Remember when the rippin’est skiers wore fire-engine-red Nordic sweaters and oversized I SKI sunglasses-with no sense of irony? Relive those days-and other innocent ski eras-with the

Classic Ski Films Collection

from Topics Entertainment.

The $50 box set features nine films on eight DVDs, made long before the term “ski-porn” entered the lexicon. There’s John Jay’s 1960

Olympic Holiday

, about the Winter Games at Squaw Valley, California;

Skifully Yours

, Otto Lang’s 1939 look at the Sun Valley, Idaho, ski scene; and Dick Barrymore’s 1971

The Performers

, which documents debauchery as practiced by the K2 ski team. Highlights include Barrymore’s ’67 epic

The Last of the Ski Bums

, which follows three ordinary Americans through Europe as they schralp the Alps, win big in the casinos of Monte Carlo, and ingest hearty amounts of soft cheese and vino. As a one-piece-wearing character says, “Wine, women, and skiing-what could be better?” Maybe the sport hasn’t changed so much after all. (topics-ent.com)

MARCH/APRIL 2006

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