surfing movies

Surf and Skate at SLO Film Fest

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DOGTOWN AND Z-BOYS

This year’s San Luis Obispo International Film Festival, opening April 23, presents the richest Skate/Surf program that I’ve ever seen at a mainstream film festival. Here are the highlights.

  • Friday, April 26: The always popular Surf Night featuring Trilogy: New Wave. Expect the Fremont to be packed again with surfers enjoying drinks in the lobby and the Riff Tide surf band before the screening. The documentary Trilogy: New Wave profiles three emerging pro stars on the world tour as they travel together to some of the world’s top surf destinations. The young guys are engaging and the audience will be stoked by the cinematography.
  • Sunday, April 28: The award-winning 2001 skateboard documentary Dogtown and Z-boys with the 2023 short 4DWN. The director of Dogtown and Z-boys, filmmaker and skateboard icon Stacy Peralta will attend; a surfer and one of the pioneers of modern skateboarding, and a founder of the Powell Peralta skateboard product company, Peralta also wrote the 2005 Lords of Dogtown. Beforehand, the audience can enjoy custom skateboard designs, with live-screen printing of these custom designs by the San Luis Obispo High School Advanced Graphic Design class.
  • Monday, April 29: The movie at the SLO Film Fest’s very first Surf Nite was the 2004 surf doc Riding Giants, also directed by Stacy Peralta. Riding Giants focuses on the obsessive search for the best wave by some of the greatest surfers in history. We see “the biggest wave ever ridden” and then a monster that could be bigger.  The movie traces the discovery of the Half Moon Bay surf spot Mavericks.  And more and more, all wonderfully shot. Fittingly, Riding Giants screens at the Bay in Morro Bay – only one mile from the surf lanes at Morro Rock. IMO, Riding Giants ranks with Dana Brown’s Step into Liquid as the greatest surf documentary ever.
RIDING GIANTS

Other skate/surf films include:

  • the seminal 1978 skateboard film Skateboard.
  • the 2024 documentary Art and Life: The Story of Jim Phillips, chronicling the most important figure ever in skateboard art (most famously the Screaming Hand and the Santa Cruz Red Dot). Phillips is a very sympathetic guy with an interesting personal journey. It’s well-sourced deep dive into skateboard art, skateboard manufacturing, surfing art and rock poster art, and almost everything happens just up the coast in Santa Cruz.

The entire surf and skate program at SLO Film Fest shreds. Here’s a clip from for Riding Giants:

DVD/Stream of the Week: hang ten this summer!

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Let’s go surfin’ now

Everybody’s learning how

Come on and safari with me

It’s a great time for the two most awesome and gnarly surfing movies, the documentaries Step Into Liquid and Riding Giants.

Step Into Liquid (2003): We see the world’s best pro surfers in the most extreme locations. We also see devoted amateurs in the tiny ripples of Lake Michigan and surfing evangelists teaching Irish school children. The cinematography is remarkable – critic Elvis Mitchell called the film “insanely gorgeous”. The filmmaker is Dana Brown, son of Bruce Brown, who made The Endless Summer (1966) and The Endless Summer II (1994).

Step Into Liquid is available on DVD from Netflix and to stream from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=YqzHvcwJmQY%3F

Riding Giants (2004): This film focuses on the obsessive search for the best wave by some of the greatest surfers in history. We see “the biggest wave ever ridden” and then a monster that could be bigger. The movie traces the discovery of the Half Moon Bay surf spot Mavericks. And more and more, all wonderfully shot.

The filmmaker is Stacy Peralta, a surfer and one the pioneers of modern skateboarding (and a founder of the Powell Peralta skateboard product company). Peralta also made Dogtown and Z-boys (2001), the great documentary about the roots of skateboarding, and wrote the 2005 Lords of Dogtown.

Riding Giants is also available on DVD from Netflix and to stream from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=NcaZarxilJQ%3F

DVD/Stream of the Week: hang ten this summer!

by

Let’s go surfin’ now

Everybody’s learning how

Come on and safari with me

It’s a great time for the two most awesome and gnarly surfing movies, the documentaries Step Into Liquid and Riding Giants.

Step Into Liquid (2003): We see the world’s best pro surfers in the most extreme locations. We also see devoted amateurs in the tiny ripples of Lake Michigan and surfing evangelists teaching Irish school children. The cinematography is remarkable – critic Elvis Mitchell called the film “insanely gorgeous”. The filmmaker is Dana Brown, son of Bruce Brown, who made The Endless Summer (1966) and The Endless Summer II (1994).

 

Riding Giants (2004): This film focuses on the obsessive search for the best wave by some of the greatest surfers in history. We see “the biggest wave ever ridden” and then a monster that could be bigger. The movie traces the discovery of the Half Moon Bay surf spot Mavericks. And more and more, all wonderfully shot.

The filmmaker is Stacy Peralta, a surfer and one the pioneers of modern skateboarding (and a founder of the Powell Peralta skateboard product company). Peralta also made Dogtown and Z-boys (2001), the great documentary about the roots of skateboarding, and wrote the 2005 Lords of Dogtown.

DVDs of the Week: hang ten this summer!

by

Let’s go surfin’ now

Everybody’s learning how

Come on and safari with me

It’s a great time for the two most awesome and gnarly surfing movies, the documentaries Step Into Liquid and Riding Giants.

Step Into Liquid (2003):  We see the world’s best pro surfers in the most extreme locations.  We also see devoted amateurs in the tiny ripples of Lake Michigan and surfing evangelists teaching Irish school children.  The cinematography is remarkable – critic Elvis Mitchell called the film “insanely gorgeous”.  The filmmaker is Dana Brown, son of Bruce Brown, who made The Endless Summer (1966) and The Endless Summer II (1994).

 

Riding Giants (2004):  This film focuses on the obsessive search for the best wave by some of the greatest surfers in history. We see “the biggest wave ever ridden” and then a monster that could be bigger.  The movie traces the discovery of the Half Moon Bay surf spot Mavericks.  And more and more, all wonderfully shot.

The filmmaker is Stacy Peralta, a surfer and one the pioneers of modern skateboarding (and a founder of the Powell Peralta skateboard product company).  Peralta also made Dogtown and Z-boys (2001), the great documentary about the roots of skateboarding, and wrote the 2005 Lords of Dogtown.

 

Both of these films make my list of Best Sports Movies.

Best Sports Movies

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Both of my recommended  surfing films are mentioned in my Best Sports Movies.   I have a list of 10 Best Sports Movies and also a top movie for each sport.  What’s my top pick for a basketball movie?  Or football? Or wrestling?  Or skateboarding?  Or rowing?  Or shuffleboard?  Is shuffleboard a sport?

Here’s a clip from my pick for best bodybuilding movie.  You will probably recognize this guy.

DVD of the Week: Hang ten this summer

by

Let’s go surfin’ now

Everybody’s learning how

Come on and safari with me

It’s a great time for the two coolest surfing movies, the documentaries Step Into Liquid and Riding Giants.

Step Into Liquid (2003):  We see the world’s best pro surfers in the most extreme locations.  We also see devoted amateurs in the tiny ripples of Lake Michigan and surfing evangelists teaching Irish school children.  The cinematography is remarkable – critic Elvis Mitchell called the film “insanely gorgeous”.  The filmmaker is Dana Brown, son of Bruce Brown, who made The Endless Summer (1966) and The Endless Summer II (1994).

Riding Giants (2004):  This film focuses on the obsessive search for the best wave by some of the greatest surfers in history. We see “the biggest wave ever ridden” and then a monster that could be bigger.  The movie traces the discovery of the Half Moon Bay surf spot Mavericks.  And more and more, all wonderfully shot.

The filmmaker is Stacy Peralta, a surfer and one the pioneers of modern skateboading, (and a founder of the Powell Peralta skateboard product company).  Peralta also made Dogtown and Z-boys (2001), the great documentary about the roots of skateboarding, and wrote the 2005 Lords of Dogtown.

Check out my other recent DVD recommendations at DVDs of the Week.

Both of these films make my lists of Best Sports Movies.