"Skiing Brings Peace"
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What You Need To Know:
CHAMPIONS OF THE GOLDEN VALLEY is not a Muslim religious movie. It’s really a movie about being exposed to cultures and religions beyond the Golden Valley, and the strong desire for peace among the young people. The movie has a deep commitment to family. It’s also a clean movie, but there are rumors of wars and discussions of wars. CHAMPIONS OF THE GOLDEN VALLEY offers a great insight into the forces of history and the need for redemption.
Content:
More Detail:
CHAMPIONS OF THE GOLDEN VALLEY is a captivating documentary about a young man named Alishah Farhang who becomes a skier even though he lives in a remote mountain Afghan village of Bamyan, and who tries and fails to get into the Olympics as the first Afghan skier but returns to his village to start a ski race called The Challenge and teach many children how to ski. The movie stresses that his love of skiing overcomes tribal divisions and opens him to appreciate other cultures and religions.
GOLDEN VALLEY starts with a newsreel showing the giant Buddha statues that were carved over 1500 years ago in the cliffs along with caves for the Buddhist monks near Bamyan, Afghanistan. Eventually, the radical Muslims of the Taliban blew up the giant Buddha statues because they didn’t want any history that would contradict the fake history of Islam.
Alishah starts a ski race where you have to climb up the mountains and then come down in a very informal way. Some very good athletes from different villages join the race, having been sheepherders and farmers. Most of them are uneducated. One racer’s father is a Muslim Imam who says his son is a very good boy and didn’t need education, although the father is supposed to be a teacher.
Over a few short years, the young boys make skis out of planks of wood with plastic bottoms that they cut out of milk cartons and other things. Soon, girls, who aren’t supposed to do any sport in Islam, start coming to race. There’s intense competition between young men from different villages, but the competitions produce friendships and the hope they can change Afghanistan from a country of war to a country of peace.
All of this story is being told by Alishah, who’s now a refugee in Germany because the Taliban reasserted its control in 2021 thanks to the incompetence of the then American president and his administration. Alishah was targeted by the Taliban and barely made it out because he allowed women to ski. He’s now living in a small Saxon town in Germany and throughout the movie there are panoramas of the small town featuring the large, beautiful church in the middle. Alishah says many of the girl skiers got out, thanks to people from the West who are mentioned at the end of the movie, but the boys didn’t get out. As the Taliban started to regain its hold, the two best boy skiers started another race.
CHAMPIONS OF THE GOLDEN VALLEY is not a Muslim religious movie, either bashing the radicals or commending the faithful. It’s really a movie about being exposed to cultures and religions beyond the Golden Valley, and the strong desire for peace among the young people. The movie has a deep commitment to family, which Alishah reaffirms because he barely got his little family out before the Taliban started killing people.
CHAMPIONS OF THE GOLDEN VALLEY is a very clean movie with no sex, nudity and only one light obscenity, but there are rumors of wars and discussions of wars, and the horrifying revelation that the Taliban destroyed some of the greatest art in the world. Because the movie is so nuanced, it’s probably for teenagers and adults and not for younger children. Even though it its bittersweet and intimate, it’s a great insight into the forces of history and the need for redemption. As a skier who raced for a college freshman ski team, I was amazed at the quality of the skiing in this remote corner of the world where there were no instructors and no culture of skiing.