Ever wonder what it’s like to bunk up with the Volcom crew? Do you still want to now?
We all have our favorite surf films. But even the ones we’re infatuated with at one time or another collect a little dust. Let’s face it, these days you can catch any five minute edit of whichever surfer you feel like watching from your phone on your lunch break, in between classes, sitting in traffic on PCH. The surf film, the ones you buy a hard copy of and sit in front of the TV late at night, isn’t what it used to be. Just the other night I dusted off a giant stack of standards – Loose Change, Blue Horizon, a few throwbacks from The Drive Thru series. In that stash of DVD’s you have sitting at home I bet there’s a lot of good memories for you too.
Here’s some of the best ones we almost forgot how much we loved…
1. Football Shmootball (2002)
Bruce Irons. The leading man.
Football Shmootball was one of my favorites at the beginning of the millennium. There’s a lot of Bruce. And that’s rad. Basically, this Tom Fletcher film is all about the shenanigans you imagined going down if you were part of the Volcom crew on the North Shore…and there’s actually even a little bit of football action in the first minute. Who’d a thunk? It has all the makings of the modern Volcom House’s persona, red solo cups and all.
There’s a bit of the movie that glorifies North Shore regulating with guys like Kala Alexander, Kaiborg Garcia and a few others talking up their scrums. But in all fairness to Volcom, 2002 was still a time when violence in surfing wasn’t nearly as taboo as it’s become today. But it doesn’t take away from the copious amounts of barrels at Pipe.
And a Ho’Brah for…Did I mention there’s a lot of Bruce in this film?
2. Out of Order (2003)
Osiris’ Out of Order, directed by Michael Sterling Eaton, is another film with a little too much of the glorified localism for today’s crowd. It is a good thing fighting doesn’t seem so glamorous anymore, but also another reminder that this is how some companies established their brand for a while. In fact, I vividly remember strongly disliking a lot of surfers in this film because they were straight up assholes. But there’s a helluva lot of globetrotting and that always got my juices going. This was a long film, so there are a lot of spots that get their fair share of love in each section. Since the surfing itself wasn’t mindblowing it actually allowed you to focus on the locations and appreciate them for the uniqueness of each wave, or even the different moods of traveling to a certain place. A trip to Mexico felt nothing like a surf trip to the North Shore (Duh). The Indo and Tahiti segments were always my favorite. Growing up in Northern California I remember surfing all day long during summer. I’d come home late at night with my cheap pizza and sit in the garage fixing dings or spray painting boards while watching this movie. I could just hit play and daydream I was anywhere else in the world that didn’t require me to wear a 4/3 through the entire summer.
Bonus points for… Jay Adams charging on the North Shore in this one.
Chasing the Lotus (2006)
I borrowed this DVD from a friend and never gave it back (sorry Brother Andy!). It’s ok though, he still made me one of his groomsmen and I got a surf movie out of the deal. This is a wonderful snapshot of surfing’s history – at least part of it. Imagine a bunch of 8mm film and old photos that have been dug up, with the narrative told from hindsight’s perfect 20/20 vision. Greg Weaver and Spyder Williams were two of surf cinematography’s greatest, with this film pretty much putting a stamp on their impact on the surf world as we know it today. It rehashes what it was like to live and surf in a time where people like Gerry Lopez were still discovering waves like Uluwatu. It’s surfing and psychedelics. It’s surfing and discovery. It’s surfing and inspiration, and a whole bunch of old school style.
Double Shaka for…Jeff Bridges narrates. THE DUDE! Narrating a surf film!…if you’re not into the whole brevity thing.
