One needn't be an extreme snow-sports enthusiast to enjoy the beauty, wit, and endlessly inventive action-cinematography of Warren Miller's films. A pioneer in sports filmmaking, Miller began his career--as we find out in this excellent, four-title boxed set--shooting 8mm footage in 1947 Sun Valley, Idaho, keeping body and soul together with ketchup soup and wild rabbits. A half-century-plus later, Miller produces, narrates, and occasionally provides a cameo in his films; three of them, included here, are travelogues set in some of the wildest, most dazzling, and even exotic places on Earth.

The best of the lot, Cold Fusion, involves serious globe-hopping through four continents: Join a long, long hike through Kenya to ski what remains of a disappearing glacier, and later watch the surreal ballet of multiple "aerialists" launched high on the slopes at Colorado's Winter Park Big Air Expedition. Scale up--and snowboard down--an impossibly steep peak in Waddington, U.K., and then, believe it or not, ski Iran, a place "between dreams and awakening, of hot tea and cherry tobacco."

Ride provides its own thrills, traipsing after Whistler's avalanche hunters as they launch explosives clearing landslides before landslides clear skiers. Stick around for stops in New Zealand and France, plus helicopter skiing in the North Cascades, snowboarding the bouncy trail of the Breckenridge Bumps, and cross a war zone in Russia to reach (via creaky cable cars and choppers) the top of Europe.

Storm continues the fun in British Columbia's Blue River, Aspen's Roaring Fork Valley, Lake Tahoe, and Antarctica's South Georgia Island, the haunting first site of Ernest Shackleton's legendary, ill-fated voyage. Rounding out this DVD collection is the retrospective Fifty, an album of highlights (e.g., snowboarding in the Chugach Range, near the site of the Valdez crash) that takes a fun, then-and-now approach.

If you bought the product for something other than fun, and entertainment... like actually learning to ski. Just check out the rest of the disk!

Some of the best stuff for beginners is appropriately placed in SPECIAL FEATURES. This where you will find close to an hour of superb instruction with the Fundamentals of cross country skiing. Fully narrated and perfectly performed. The target audience is beginner to intermediate. Perhaps a bit of a progression for a complete beginner. Then if you dig further into the DVD-ROM features on your computer explore for Tao of Skiing. This is a complete instructional multimedia ski tour.

I find it incredible that some of the reviewers could have missed most of the disk!!! If you can navigate around a simple DVD menu structure you will get the most out of the disk and get to what interests you the most. Personally, I loved the variety. I had some entertaining chapters to motivate me and an equal amount of instructional chapters to help me grow as a skier.

Modern freeheel technique and nordic/crosscountry/skate skiing acually have very little in common. Once you understand what this video is for then you can appreciate its value.
It is the only instructional video on modern freeheel technique that I know of, and although it can't teach you how to ski, it has valuable tips for all telemark skiers of all levels and all abilities. It covers everything from the very basics to full on big mountain freeriding. If you are looking to improve you telemark technique and style then this video is for you.

The technique volume in the Science of Nordic Skiing series represents a clear view to the most current understanding of technique and instruction. The project has engaged key principals, elite skiers, recognized experts and thought-leaders in the sport; consolidated their ideas and arrived at a progressive and highly-effective approach to the technique, which you can apply directly to your skiing and fast-track your development this season. This is the most comprehensive work on nordic skiing technique ever produced and represents an enduring product, all for the price of a ski lesson

Part 1 of the Science of Nordic Skiing DVD series provides an in-depth examination of the sports science. It is tailored to engage the skier the more richly, with clever and concise delivery of technique. Other volumes cover training, equipment and advanced moves. This series is intended for intermediate, advanced and expert level skiers, coaches, instructors and for the certification of nordic ski professionals.

Every DVD in the series provides a highly interactive toolkit; using menus, multiple viewing angles, alternate audio tracks, and subtitles. The DVD-ROM features also include: technical manuals, multimedia explanations, critical and alternative analysis, bio-mechanical modeling, narrative scripts, hyperlinks to on-line resources, MP3 audio books, a photo gallery, behind the scenes footage and bonus movies.

Unlimited Skiiing DVD is the most complete instructional and motivational package for skiing, ever produced. Endorsed by Cross Country Canada, Biathlon Canada and the National Coaching Program. Double DVD Package with extensive DVD-ROM content and special features. Run Time 4+ Hours.

The movie "UNLIMITED"engages some of the best outdoor athletes in the New World, breath taking cinematography and an exhilarating sound track to craft "a New Kind of Action" constituted from "Clean Oxygen Fed Sport."

Featuring music by Sum41, Roch Voisine, Dean Batstone and Drastik, and the talent of two-dozen Olympic and World-Class athletes in a variety of outdoor and adventure sports including Nordic skiing, trail running, triathlon, inline, mountain biking, rowing, telemark skiing, para-gliding, roller skiing, cycling, paddling, climbing and adventure racing.

From Mammoth Mountain in California comes a mountain of material from the inaugural Gravity Games, the hippest competition ever to hurtle downhill. This DVD, with a running time of more than 200 minutes, features elaborate coverage of events including Big Air, Superpipe, Boardercross, and Freestyle Snowboarding. Shot by a number of video and film cameras, the action footage is often stunning, and some high mountain panoramas that frame the competition scenes are gorgeous enough to look at home in a National Geographic nature documentary. Billed as a "winter lifestyle music and adrenaline sports festival," the two-week event attracted the most talented practitioners of what the narration calls "adrenaline sports." The creative presentation of the action suits the frenetic pace of the downhill events, and a soundtrack of rock and rap accompanies shots of snowboarders performing tricks high in the air.

Flawlwss runs. Perfectly carved turns. AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN! Ski Mayhem on DVD features the most twisted outtake reel of ski tricks gone horribly wrong. Footage 15 years in the making.

This has got to be the best instructional skiing video I have yet seen--I've seen maybe 6 instructional videos already. My brother, an intermediate skier who introduced me to skiing, watched it with me and loved it as he learned many things also. The one hour video is well organized. Lito claims to have self-taught himself to ski before starting to teach others, but this bit of knowledge does not in any way diminish his credibility or the instructions he provides. I have compared his methods against other more "professional" instructions and found his to be equivalent to the others in combination. But the way he organizes and explains his techniques separates this video from the rest because his instructions are more readily absorbable, make the emphasis with far less repetition, and are maybe even more poetic. Some people sell videos but can't teach. In my opinion, Lito is a master instructor. He does have two other skiing DVD's in this series that I have not yet seen that might cover more advanced techniques such as the latest craze of two-footed skiing. This skill though is geared more toward the professional racers or for the super duper skiers who want the versatility for expert-level all terrain skiing. That would not be me when considering skill, athleticism, equipment (money) and time, which would perhaps be the same for more than 95+% of skiers out there. If you really want that, you might want to look at "Anyone Can Be An Expert Skier 2". The skills Lito teaches have been around for a century, so it's tried and true and definitely not outdated. For meer mortals who just love to ski and want to do better, start with the wedge (or snow plow) and then go to a very knowledgeable skiing friend or turn to this video or do both. You would not need to watch 6 or more videos like I did to find the right one.

Now you can own all three award-winning videos in one box set! Ski Movie, Ski Movie II: High Society and Ski Movie III: The Front Line. Ski Movie III took Powder Magazine's "Best Movie of the Year" and it's no mystery how the Matchstick crew pulls it off. These movies feature some of the best athletes, locations and overall footage that any ski movie has ever produced. Morrison, McConkey, Dorion, Moseley, Auclair, W. Fisher, Oakden, Pollard, Fujas, Collins, Burge, McGovern, Davenport and Hall are just a few of the pros you'll see in this series. Bonus: Steve Winter & Murray Wais of Matchstick Productions bundled up the Best Of footage from The Hedonist, The Tribe, Fetish and Pura Vida four of the sickest ski videos from MSP. Second Nature is filled with bold tricks, treacherous vertical and a crash section brimming with high-speed, snowy cartwheels from your favorites including Morrison, Cummings and McConkey.