Warning: clicking on the video link will play "Last Christmas" by Wham! Do not do so if you want to avoid losing Whamageddon and being sent to Whamhalla.
It's an unbelievable 40 years since Wham! released their Christmas Number 1, and the snowy mountain village where it was filmed is cashing in. Saas-Fee in the Valais in Switzerland is keen to get tourists along and this article in the Financial Times tells all.
"Visitors who come to schuss down its 150km of pistes will also discover guided Wham! walks, Wham! cocktails, Wham! parties and, in the town’s museum, alongside 19th-century weaving looms, beds, dresses and ice axes, a new exhibition on the pop group’s stay in the Swiss Alps four decades ago."
The video was shot in late November for a December release, even though the song was recorded in August. The ride in the cable car, only lasted for 50 metres, before they came down again. But normally it goes up to the start of the world’s highest funicular railway, which in turn ends 3,457 metres above sea level at the Allalin, the world’s highest revolving restaurant.
Here's the true story of why this location was chosen:
"A location scout contacted [the hotel owner] because the crew of the movie The Razor’s Edge, which included actor Bill Murray, had been shooting mountain scenes in India. But they all got food poisoning and needed to recreate the same look in Europe. They chose Saas-Fee. A month later I got another call from him, this time about an English pop group wanting to shoot a Christmas-themed video. They were going to Gstaad but the snow wasn’t great, and could we accommodate them here? Of course, I said yes.”
Watch out on 14th December for a new documentary on the iPlayer, "Wham! Last Christmas Unwrapped". And if you haven't seen it yet, the new "Do They Know It's Christmas?" making-of doc is now available, clcking in at 75 minutes, 25 times the length of the original song.
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