Some of the finest films shown at the Banff Mountain Film Festival are coming to Jasper. The event’s world tour rolls into town next Monday (December 12) and organizers are predicting a full house.

The Chaba Theatre, which is hosting the screenings, has 170 tickets available. The ducats are on sale at the theatre box office and at Gravity Gear and are available in advance, something that theatre staff highly recommend.

Organizers will wait until the last minute to finalize the lineup for the screening, but estimate that the films will clock in at approximately two and a half hours.

The choices will be made once the tour tapes actually arrive in Jasper and the hosts have a chance to discuss the films on offer with the Film Festival staff that travel with the tour.

The tentative plan is to centre the evening around “Magic Mountain”, a 50-minute cultural film.

Produced, directed and filmed by Canmore couple Pat and Baiba Morrow, “Magic Mountain” tells the tale of Cynthia Hunt, the founder of a literacy organization in Ladakh, India. As she travels through incredible mountain landscapes, the film follows her efforts to teach illiterate women and improve their quality of life.

The film, which captured the People’s Choice award at last month’s main festival in Banff, has been screening at most tour locations.

“It’s been doing extremely well,” said World Tour Manager Jim Baker from his office in Banff. “It’s an inspiring story and a different story.”

Much like the festival itself, local hosts are planning to strike a balance between culture, environment and adventure in the films that they show in Jasper.

Another two films almost sure to be seen on Monday are “High Fly Summits” and “The Lost People of Mountain Village”.

The first of these is a French film about the Soul Flyer team. This group of adventurous paragliders fly over, and ski on, some of the world’s most well-known summits, including Mont Blanc and Mount Fuji.

“It’s an unusual kind of combination,” said Baker. “It has some very unique skydiving in it.” In one sequence, jumpers in wing suits drop almost 1,000 feet from an airplane above Mont Blanc.

The second film tells the story of a lost backcountry skier who stumbles onto a monumental complex of uninhabited structures and attempts to discover what happened to the people of this mountain village.

“This has had really positive feedback,” Baker said. “Many people felt it was extremely appropriate for their communities. It’s very funny and very well executed.”

Films from Banff are screened all over the world, with the tour vans leaving the festival offices just hours after the annual event wraps up in November.

For the very first screening this year, more than 1,700 people turned up in Great Falls, Montana.

“The tour has started off really well this year,” said Baker. 

Tickets for the Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour cost $20 and are available in advance from the Chaba Theatre and Gravity Gear