Double Award For Lee And Halsted Film

Congratulations to OUTDOORSmagic contributor Alastair Lee and his partner David Halsted who emerged from last weekend's Kendal Mountain Film Festival with not just one, but two awards for their new climbing comedy, 'Storms - The Movie'.

Alastair (left) and David - collecting awards for fun, but we reckon the little fella
is the real brains behind the operation :-)

Not only did Storms win the People's Choice Award, following in the crampon-marks of last year's triumphal Twice Upon A Time in Bolivia, it also - to Alastair's amazement - also received the 'Best Mountain Culture Film'.

I Nearly Didn't Go To The Ceremony...

'We were getting loads of good feedback but I was convinced the judges would hate it and had a feeling we would come second in the People's Choice to Ian Wright's excellent adventure or Return2Sender,' Alastair told us.

'I nearly didn't go to the awards ceremony as I had two lectures on the following Monday and was already exhausted. I was pretty much falling asleep in the awards ceremony. When I heard 'Storms' mentioned, we all just looked at each other in a state of shock and excitement. I just thought 'what category are we on?!'

'Then the judge started talking about intelligent humor without being aggressive, high production values and something about a reminder to us all not to take yourself too seriously, then we were awarded 'Best Mountain Culture Film'. Five minutes later, still in shock from the first award, we were back on stage collecting the People's Choice award - amazing!'

Alastair hopes that Storms' recognition from the judging panel may 'open the doors a little and help move mountain film-making away from the formulaic and predictable.'

To which we say, amen, and well done to Alastair and David. If you want to follow in their footsteps, see Alastair's top film tips article linked below. We reckon Storms - The Movie on DVD should end up in a good few OM stockings this ******mas and we'll be bringing you a full review shortly.