{"id":61331,"date":"2018-08-30T17:35:40","date_gmt":"2018-08-30T23:35:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/40-years-ago-tamarron-was-the-site-of-a-cinematic-disaster\/"},"modified":"2018-08-30T23:35:40","modified_gmt":"2018-08-30T23:35:40","slug":"40-years-ago-tamarron-was-the-site-of-a-cinematic-disaster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/40-years-ago-tamarron-was-the-site-of-a-cinematic-disaster\/","title":{"rendered":"40 years ago, Tamarron was the site of a cinematic disaster"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><!-- gallery:7d02fbd2-b820-4ceb-9252-8f269e959035 --><\/p>\n<p>On Feb 8, 1978, more than 800 residents lined the street in front of the Strater Hotel, hoping to be in an avalanche. Not a real one but a cinematic one \u2013 the film \u201cAvalanche,\u201d directed by Corey Allen. That day, the film crew was looking for local stand-ins for actors including the film\u2019s star, Rock Hudson.<\/p>\n<p>Filmed between Feb. 22 and March 26, 1978, at the Tamarron Ski and Golf Resort, the film follows an array of characters who converge at the resort for its grand opening. Hudson plays David Shelby, the resort\u2019s wealthy owner, and Mia Farrow stars as his ex-wife, Caroline Brace. Robert Forster co-stars as Nick Thorne, an environmental photographer who tries to warn the resort-goers that the mountain is unsafe. As per usual in a disaster film, the warnings are ignored as everyone focuses on their own personal dramas. One thing leads to another, and the titular avalanche finally destroys the resort, setting off a series of further disasters.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAvalanche\u201d was released in August 1978 but failed to gain much attention. The few figures available indicate that the film probably broke even on a $6.5 million budget. It was then largely forgotten for almost 40 years until April 2017, when it was featured for comedic riffing on \u201cMystery Science Theater 3000\u201d on Netflix.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video wp-block-embed-youtube naviga-video-embed\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/klcAwujWHwY\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Choosing DurangoIn an interview with The Durango Herald, Roger Corman, executive producer of \u201cAvalanche,\u201d said the script came from an idea he had. While scouting locations, Corman chose Tamarron because of its unique features.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI liked the ski resort and also the relationship of it to the mountains around it because it had to be in a position where an avalanche would actually hit the resort headquarters, the hotel and so forth,\u201d he said. \u201cIn a lot of places, the hotel is a little distance from the actual ski area. We needed proximity, so the avalanche would hit the hotel \u2013 which we did just slightly with artificial snow machines, and then we did the key shots with special effects.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Key members of the crew arrived from Hollywood, but the film staffed much of the crew with residents, Corman said. Durango carpenters and electricians were put to work as grips and gaffers, and locals were cast in small roles.<\/p>\n<p>Local cooperation extended beyond just cast and crew, though. For a scene filmed March 8 in downtown Durango, the production not only borrowed vehicles but also bought a police car, fire truck and a van from the city.<\/p>\n<p>For Sandy King, who worked on \u201cAvalanche\u201d as a script supervisor, the film symbolized the last project many members of the crew would share.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCorman was a non-union film company and a bunch of us had come up together,\u201d she said. \u201cMike Finnell, the unit manager on \u2018Avalanche\u2019 \u2026 had come up with us as a prop man. A bunch of us had just gotten in the union, and we all got waivers to come back and work for him on his first production job. \u2026 It was kind of our swan song for doing Corman films.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe all joked because usually they were very rough \u2013 they were low budget, so you were usually off in the Mojave Desert somewhere blowing things up. And we were saying, \u2018Oh, my God, we\u2019re going to die out in the snow instead.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"naviga-element naviga-subheadline1\">Filming in the snow<\/div>\n<p>The filming of \u201cAvalanche\u201d was not without problems. The cast and crew\u2019s greatest adversary came from the environment itself.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt snowed like hell,\u201d Forster said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShooting in snow is very, very difficult,\u201d Corman said. \u201cFor instance \u2026 normally you shoot a scene and the director says \u2018All right, let\u2019s go for take two,\u2019 and you just go for take two. If you\u2019re shooting in snow, you go for take two and it means you have to stop and you send a couple guys out to erase the tracks of the people moving through the snow from take one. And so you have to do that every take, which slows you down and makes it complicated to shoot.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=d3d691d4-da8b-4788-83ce-85a9b4e637b2&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" alt=\"The 1978 disaster movie \u201cAvalanche,\u201d starring Rock Hudson, Mia Farrow and Robert Forster, was filmed in Durango and at Tamarron.\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">The 1978 disaster movie \u201cAvalanche,\u201d starring Rock Hudson, Mia Farrow and Robert Forster, was filmed in Durango and at Tamarron.<\/span><span class=\"credit\">Courtesy of IMDb<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><p>The snow further complicated the production as winter came to an end.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOne day, there was snow all over the mountains,\u201d King said. \u201cAnd then one day, spring hit and we\u2019re having to watch where we had our shots lined up because suddenly there were brown patches in the hill and flowers coming up through the snow.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The cast and crew worked hard to get the film shot on schedule \u2013 more or less. King said she remembers one day in which a food fight erupted in the hotel\u2019s ballroom where the crew ate.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI remember flying chocolate cake, which was a really rude circumstance,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>There were also alcohol-fueled antics. \u201cI remember \u2026 very vividly when the crew figured out you could breathe fire and light Everclear on fire,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>But by and large, King said, the cast and crew worked hard to finish the film on schedule.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA lot of people think that making movies is all cocaine and limousines \u2013 it\u2019s not,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s freezing your ass off in the snow and not being able to come in and get warm.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the rush to finish the film, some problems were overlooked.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI thought the special effects company did not do as good a job as they might have,\u201d Corman said. \u201cBut we had a date for it to appear \u2026 and we had to meet that date. I would have liked to have an extra couple of weeks in post-production to work on the special effects.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"naviga-element naviga-subheadline1\">Now on Netflix<\/div>\n<p>Contemporary opinions about \u201cAvalanche\u201d varied wildly. The Washington Post wrote, \u201cThis fizzled brainstorm \u2026 looks like a cinch for the first supplement to The 50 Worst Films of All Time.\u201d Others were more forgiving. Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times wrote, \u201cAlthough \u2018Avalanche\u2019 is a formula disaster picture, its well-drawn, credible people and swift pacing combine to make it a satisfying diversion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The film\u2019s popularity faded quickly, and it remained forgotten until the crew of \u201cMystery Science Theater 3000\u201d dug it up to lampoon for a new generation.<\/p>\n<p>Joel Hodgson, one of the creators of \u201cMST3K,\u201d said that \u2013 through its process of riffing on the on-screen action as the movie plays \u2013 the series typically sends up \u201cforgotten movies, orphaned movies or cheesy movies.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAvalanche\u201d stuck out not only as a member of that category but also as a well-made film.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI try to find movies that are kind of nice-looking,\u201d he said. \u201cThere can be bad movies that were really not cared for, so the prints are bad, the sound is bad. And there\u2019s also bad movies that were shot capably and edited well and the sound still is intact.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were able to get a good print of \u2018Avalanche,\u2019 and that has a lot to do with it for me \u2013 that it\u2019s not hard on the eyes \u2026 a pleasant environment to be in.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAvalanche\u201d was a great film to lampoon, Hodgson said, \u201cbecause it had Rock Hudson and Mia Farrow and it was a disaster movie, so all those elements are always really interesting and fantastic.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em class=\"mwc_shirttail\"><a href=\"mailto:ngonzales@durangoherald.com\">ngonzales@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u2018Avalanche\u2019 starred Rock Hudson, Mia Farrow, Robert Forster<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":61332,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[950,1167,13,1107,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-61331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-durango","tag-exclude-homepage-video","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-movies","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61331"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61331\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61331"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=61331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}