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Femme Fatale
The Ladies Are Killin' It As Video Stars
by Katie Bailey
When I finally score an interview with the ridiculously busy Fabia Grueebler, cofounder of Misschief Films, she’s refreshingly upfront about her all-girl snowboard video, 2005’s As If.
“We weren’t trying to be feminist,” she says bluntly. “All we wanted to do was show that snowboarding is about being out there with your friends and having a good time. I think that’s why we succeeded—we weren’t trying to talk about it or whine about it. It’s just like, hey, we’re a bunch of friends, and it just so happens that all of our friends are the sickest riders.”
Writing about women-specific anything is fraught with a certain amount of danger. Part of you wants to scream “Girl power!” like an amphetamine-fueled Spice Girl, while the other part of you wants desperately to prove there’s no difference between the girls and the boys—besides, of course, boobs. But Grueebler’s comment, barely 10 minutes into our conversation, makes me relax and put aside my femphobias. This isn’t a feel-good conversation about cuddly times at the girls-only camp. Instead, she throws down a real-world breakdown in filmmaking à la femme, and what it takes to do so successfully.
It’s no secret that, until recently, girls were largely neglected in the big-budget, wide-distribution shred-video department. Sure, they were landing parts, but they were short, too few between, and buried somewhere toward the end of the DVD. To fill the gap, two film crews, Misschief Films in North America and ChunkyKnit Productions in Europe, stepped in with full-length, all-girls snowboarding vids. As Misschief and ChunkyKnit prepare to release their second and third films, respectively, their founders and starring riders reflect on what it was like to get their start and the challenges of putting snow and sweat to celluloid. So grab yourself a soda and some popcorn—the curtain has risen, and the reel is rolling the women’s snowboarding movement.
To get the whole story, pick up the Snowboard Canada Women's Annual, on newsstands now.
