Straight Line

Montana Bandits Unleashed

The Montana Bandits—born out of a lawless spirit and obsession with Tarantino movies—started taking the whole “making ski movies” thing seriously.
Left to right: Back where it all started at Sleeping Giant Ski Area, WY, in 2021—the trip that motivated us to chase the dream of filming. Photo: Montana Bandits Archive Wyatt Smith and I didn’t think one of us straight lining this chute in southern Montana would be all that impressive. But both of us skiing side by side? That would be something for the movies. I jokingly suggested we “test” our airbags mid-line. Photo: Finn Histon We premiered Bandits Unchained in a public park in Bozeman, MT, and spent the days before handing out thousands of paper flyers on the Montana State University campus and downtown. Our efforts paid off, with over 1,000 attendees. The film wrapped at 9 p.m. and we didn’t have the park cleared out till 11 p.m.—the closest we’ve ever come to inciting a riot. Photo: Claire Lichtwardt
Words: Max Ritter. Captions:Jack Feick

In October of 2020, Jack Feick begged a MTN News van to interview him at the base of Bridger Bowl, MT. The notoriously rugged ski area hadn’t opened yet, but an early-season storm had drawn local skiers out of the woodwork. Twenty-year-old Feick, a film student at Montana State University, was determined to get some time on air. “I practically laid down in front of the car,” he says. “Begrudgingly, they said yes, and I acted like a total idiot, just going off about how epic the conditions were, trying to make my friends laugh.”

The clip went viral, and a few weeks later, the owner of Wyoming’s Sleeping Giant Ski Area, just outside Yellowstone National Park, reached out to see if Feick and his friends wanted to visit. “He said he loved our energy and invited us to come make a video there,” says Feick. Feick, along with his roommates Wyatt Smith, Rob Foster, Finn Histon and Chris ‘Big C’ Erhard brought their untamed freeride energy to the sleepy two-lift ski area to film a short video. They spent the day building jumps on low-angle groomers and dropping pillows above the resort outside the ski area’s boundaries. They were letting loose—college kids taking advantage of a free weekend of skiing—but it instigated something more. “That was the trip that we were like, ‘We should start making ski movies together,’” says Feick.