Somewhere around a million years ago in internet time, in 2013, John John Florence and his team released the film Done.
It was three years before John John’s first world title. He had O’Neill stickers on his board. He was still John John Florence, but he hadn’t quite reached the level of surfing fame he has today. At the time, he was only two years into his CT career, but he had begun pouring the mix that would eventually become the cement that glued him into surfing’s history books. Everyone already knew his name, but he was still the guy who was GOING to win world titles, not the guy who already had.
Done was created under the direction of Blake Kueny, and it threw the surfing world for a serious loop. Watch above as Matt Meola looks back through the misty fog of time at an air session in Western Australia that would change his life, the life of Albee Layer, and of course, John John’s.
“John John ended up getting the cover of Surfer Magazine,” Meola says. “Albee and I both got invited by Kai Neville to do the Kustom Air Strike trip — which to us was huge, because the best aerialists in the world got to go on that trip. John John was a shoo-in to go on that trip, because of course he’s going, and he ended up going on to win… and it was all because of that surf session. When I look back, that’s a really special moment in my surf career. And in my life.”
