Ski School (film)

Ski School
Ski School
Directed by	Damian Lee
Written by	David Mitchell
Produced by	Damian Lee; Curtis Petersen
Starring	Dean Cameron; Tom Bresnahan; Stuart Fratkin; Darlene Vogel; Charlie Spradling; Patrick Labyorteaux; Mark Thomas Miller; Ava Fabian; Spencer Rochfort; John Pyper-Ferguson
Cinematography	Curtis Petersen
Edited by	Reid Dennison
Music by	Steve Hunter
Distributed by	Moviestore Entertainment
Release date	January 11, 1991;
Running time	95 minutes (US), 89 minutes elsewhere
Country	Canada
Language	English
Box office	$18,476

Ski School is a 1991 comedy film directed by Damian Lee and starring Dean Cameron. Its plot concerns a fictional ski school. A sequel, Ski School 2, followed in 1994, also starring Cameron.

Plot

A hard-partying section of the school, Section 8, led by Dave Marshak (Dean Cameron) must face a more buttoned-up section of the school led by Reid Janssens (Mark Thomas Miller) to save their jobs. They recruit hotshot newcomer John Roland (Tom Bresnahan) to help them win an end-of-the-season skiing competition and also play a series of hilarious pranks on Reid and his cronies (especially, Derek and Eric) along the way.

Cast

Dean Cameron as Dave Marshak
Tom Bresnahan as John E. Roland
Patrick Labyorteaux as Ed Young
Mark Thomas Miller as Reid Janssens
Spencer Rochfort as Derek Stevens
Darlene Vogel as Lori
Stuart Fratkin as "Fitz" Fitzgerald
Charlie Spradling as Paulette
Ava Fabian as Victoria
Gaetana Korbin as Bridget
Mark Brandon as Anton Bryce
John Pyper-Ferguson as Erich Blor
Johnny Askwith as Bart

Production

Ski School was filmed at ski resorts in Oregon and Whistler, British Columbia.^[2]^[3] According to Dean Cameron, though, they were able to film on a modest budget because it was shot in the springtime so they "got May rates".^[2] Pick-up shots were done in Los Angeles about a year after principal production.^[4]

Cameron said in a 2016 interview that the film was sold to producers based solely on its title and a mockup movie poster, before a script was written and before any actors were cast. Cameron said they were given five months to make the movie to secure the financing.^[4]

According to Cameron, John was intended to be the lead character until actor Tom Bresnahan was injured while skiing and Dave Marshak was elevated to the lead. Cameron said that he "played Dave Marshak as Bugs Bunny."^[4]

According to Cameron and Stuart Fratkin, much of the comedy in the film was improvised or else written by the actors themselves.^[4]^[5]^[6]

Fratkin later wrote that he initially read for the lead role, but lost the job to Cameron. He wrote that he hesitated to accept the offer to play Fitz until his agent secured second billing for him.^[6]

The film's soundtrack features two songs by the band Lock Up, a late-1980s musical outfit featuring Tom Morello on guitar, antedating his Rage Against the Machine fame.

Release

The film was released theatrically in the United States on January 11, 1991, although released in Canada the previous year by Cineplex Odeon. Later that year, it was released on videocassette in the United States by HBO Video. In 2007, MGM released the film on DVD. Despite the fact that the back of the DVD says the film is presented in widescreen, it is actually presented in pan and scan.

After its release on home video, Cameron and Fratkin embarked on a promotional tour to pitch the movie to video rental stores.^[2]

Homage was paid to the film franchise by It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia in season 11, episode 3, where Dean Cameron makes a cameo appearance as a burnt-out "party dude" living on the ski slopes.^[4]

Reception

The film was panned by critics. A review in the Edmonton Journal was headlined "Ski School a wretched lesson in how not to make films."^[3] A review in the Montreal Gazette called it "truly abysmal" and a "brain-cell-destroying debacle."^[7]