I’ve never been to a film festival. Therefore, I’ve clearly never been to this month’s Surfilm Festibal in San Sebastian, Spain. I have, however, been to many a surf film premier. It’s a funny dynamic when I think of the hoots and pumped fists of a normal surf film crowd brought to the thought-provoking and earnest tone of the festivities in Spain. At least in my imagination it’s an odd dynamic.
Hermosa Particula was the first work I saw from this year’s lineup. It’s also where it first clicked how awesome a setting we have for these two dynamics: surfing in high-culture and surfing as…well, surfing. It opens with the message “To understand about the sea, it is necessary to understand about the mountains.” Then a few minutes later, you see Taro Tamai pointing it down the side of a mountain making swooping turns that look like they’d be drawn on a wave. I don’t know if I’m transported back to a Warren Miller release or if I’m supposed to act like I’m holding back tears. But I do know when that scene pops in San Sebastian, the hoots are going to be every bit as charged as the first time you saw Laird’s Wave of the Millenium on the big screen.
Looking through the rest of the Surfilm Festibal program, we get plenty more of the thoughtful, save-our-waves-and-our-culture vibe. There are plenty of talks, presentations and art exhibits aimed at appreciating history and being mindful of our choices for the future. How can we protect Mundaka and Punta de Lobos? There’s even the film La Primera Ola, a documentary looking back on the seven key moments that defined surfing in Spain.
Spanish, English… whatever the language, the hoots all come out the same.
