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Tupper native’s movie screening to benefit ski club

A still from “All In” (Image provided)

TUPPER LAKE — As snow falls on the Big Tupper Ski Area — which may open this season — skiers itching to get out on the slopes can find temporary relief at the State Theater Thursday evening.

Christine Day, along with State owner Sally Strasser, are screening the movie “All In” at Day’s sixth annual skiing movie night, raising money to send the Tupper Lake High School ski and snowboard club on a trip.

Scott Gaffney directs “All in,” and he and his brother Robb produced it through Matchstick Productions. The Tupper Lake natives live Lake Tahoe and have produced many ski films over the years through that company.

Day’s father was the Gaffney brothers’ high school art teacher, and in the summers he ran a whitewater rafting company in Canada.

“They were two of the students that went up there and worked for him, and they got a taste for the extreme sports,” Day said.

"All In" movie poster

Day said after they got hooked into extreme sports, they began producing ski movies, at a time when advancements in the sport, ski equipment and film equipment are allowing bigger tricks and better movies.

Day said the film promises 65 minutes of high-resolution “ski porn” showing drops, avalanches and big air on exotic mountains from Alaska to Japan. Since the first year of the State series she has always shown Matchstick Production movies because they conveniently release at least one a year.

“All In” is unique, she said, because it features just as many women as men in a typically male-dominated film genre.

The first year, Day screened the Gaffney brothers’ 2011 film “G.N.A.R.,” about the titular raucous game of one-upmanship, which starts with a warning about the amount of male nudity in the film.

When the skiing movie night started, it raised money for Adirondack Residents Intent on Saving their Economy when the organization was running the Big Tupper Ski Area. After ARISE stopped running the ski area, Day kept the fundraising event because she enjoys putting on events, especially ones that benefit her town.

The next two years Day fundraised for the Fire and Ice Festival, which she transformed from an afternoon event into a weekend-long festival. After that she raised money for the village’s bandshell project, and last year she raised $1,700 to send 32 kids from the ski and snowboard club to Jay Peak in Vermont.

Day said 100 percent of the proceeds go toward this year’s trip, and she plans to raise money for the high school club every year now.

“They benefit the most from it anyways,” Day said. “It gives them the opportunity to go out of state, to somewhere they would probably would never have the chance to go.”

The club can only put on one fundraising event for itself a year, relying on outside donations and events for the rest of its budget.

Day said she likes to see the younger generation get involved in skiing and said she has been encouraged as more youths come out to the annual film screening.

“It was just hard here for a while because Big Tupper Ski Area was closed for so long. Everybody kind of lost that vibe for skiing,” Day said. “We just want to create Tupper as a ski community again, like it once was.”

Before the movie starts, people can mingle in the theater. The $20 admission covers food, catered by Jreck subs, beer and wine, and chances to win ski goggles, local treats or Whiteface day passes in a raffle.

If you go…

What: “All In” movie screening

When: 6:30 p.m. Thursday, movie begins at 7 p.m.

Where: State Theater, 100 Park St., Tupper Lake

How much: $20

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