In 2014, Trevor Kennison broke his back snowboarding in the Colorado backcountry on Vail Pass. Six years later, he returned to the site of his accident to attempt the world’s first double backflip on a sit-ski.
Kennison’s story of personal and post-traumatic growth, of resiliency and reinvention, is told in the feature documentary, “Full Circle.” The 2023 film will make its Roaring Fork Valley premiere next week as part of 5Point Film’s Summer Film Series.
To kick off the series, there will be two screenings of “Full Circle.” The first will commence at the Wheeler Opera House in Aspen on Tuesday followed by another on Wednesday in Basalt at The Arts Campus At Willits. Kennison will be present at both screenings for a post Q&A discussion.
5Point launched the Summer Film Series last year as a way to expand its year-round programming and provide Roaring Fork Valley audiences with acclaimed films that are still centered around outdoor adventure, but slightly outside the realm of what the organization brings to its flagship festival every spring, said Charlie Turnbull, head of programming for 5Point Film.
“It’s sort of similar to the flagship festival in that it’s stories that are adventure or outdoors adjacent,” Turnbull said. “But we only show one feature film at the flagship festival, so this gives us a chance to kind of branch out a little bit and be slightly more experimental.”
“Full Circle” — which made its world premiere at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival and recently screened at Mountainfilm in Telluride — tells the story of not only Kennison’s recovery, but the career he has built and the athlete he has become while living with a spinal cord injury, Turnbull explained.
In parallel with Kennison’s storyline throughout the film is that of the legendary Barry Corbet, who passed away in 2004 at 68 years old. A pioneer climber, extreme skier and namesake of one of the world’s most famous ski challenges, Corbet’s Couloir at the top of Rendezvous Mountain in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Corbet broke his back in a helicopter crash in 1968 while making a ski movie near Aspen.
In the years following his spinal cord injury, which left him paralyzed from the waist down, Corbet became a seminal leader in the disability community, showing that growth after a serious injury is possible for everyone, not just adaptive athletes. And yet Corbet’s legacy has paved the way for Kennison’s feats, more than 50 years later.
In fact, Kennison became the first sit-skier to launch into Corbet’s Couloir at the 2019 Kings and Queens of Corbet’s competition. Kennison’s 60-foot leap into the nose of Corbet’s famed terrain went viral and launched his own career as a professional athlete and advocate for adaptive sports.
Turnbull explained how Kennison and Corbet’s stories mirror each other, connected by common locations and motifs — injuries in the Colorado backcountry, rehab at Craig Hospital, fame in Jackson Hole — and also through a shared resiliency and refusal to let their zeal for life be limited by their injuries.
“It's those two stories sort of intertwined and at times, in an oddly similar way — the trajectory of both of their lives — and it really follows Trevor's not only recovery, but his emergence as a sit-skiing phenom,” Turnbull said. “The Barry side of it is really cool because it's a bit of a ski-history account of like the pioneers of skiing and the pioneers of Corbet’s Couloir and heli-skiing in Jackson, so [the film] is dynamic in that it covers a lot of ground.”
Directed by Josh Berman and produced by his Level 1 production company — a reputable ski-film production company based out of Denver — “Full Circle” was filmed on location across North America, including the Aspen area, which has played a role in both Corbet and Kennison’s storylines.
“We couldn’t be more excited to share ‘Full Circle’ with Aspen and the Roaring Fork Valley,” Berman said in a statement to the Aspen Daily News. “I know the story will really resonate with the community — the mountains in and around Aspen show up in several of the film’s storylines. … Trevor actually made his very first turns in a sit-ski working with Challenge Aspen, so it feels very appropriate to screen the film in a place that had such a big impact on Trevor’s life and career.”
Kennison is currently based in Winter Park and has family in the Roaring Fork Valley. The film includes key interviews with Kennison’s family and Corbet’s family, as well as people in the spinal cord injury community.
While the “Full Circle” production team is able-bodied, the filmmakers were intentional about ensuring that the film represented the experience of living with a spinal cord injury — fully, accurately and honestly, Turnbull noted. He said they were thoughtful about working with creatives living with disabilities, too. Film composer Mark Crawford brought on a crew of musicians living with disabilities to put together the score for “Full Circle,” Turnbull said.
“It’s a really thoughtful approach to making a film about someone living with a disability,” he said. “This is a comprehensive and honest, and really emotional and powerful, look at what it's like to go from living a ski bum life and then having this traumatic accident, which completely changes your life, and then, a really honest look at the recovery process and also how someone can thrive after an incident like that."
“Full Circle” will be screened at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday and Wednesday, and tickets to both events fall in the $30-$35 range. For Wheeler Opera House tickets, visit aspenshowtix.com; for TACAW’s event, visit tacaw.org.