Endless Summer

This is the oldest doc I've watched so far. Grey Gardens was old, When You're Strange had old archive footage in it, but this was from 1966. Even just the idea that this was made and made well is fascinating to me. if it were made now, it wouldn't be as good. The proof of that (I'm guessing, I have no basis for this because I haven't seen it) is in the remake (maybe?).

Usually, I think narration or voice over seems lazy, like you couldn't create enough content so you had to voice over what was happening to explain the story to the audience. Narration in this gets sort of a pass, though. It definitely made it a bit more interesting since they clearly didn't get any audio. It made it seem like they were doing an anthropological study reel that you'd later watch in class. I the 60s. Except this study has to do with human beings and the "thrill and the fun of the sport of surfing." Kind of cool.

Despite the voice over, it was easy to forget that this thing was actually being filmed It just seems like we were going on this trip with these guys. Even WITH the voice over. How'd they do that? That's the best kind of doc. The camera just disappeared.. And I think that gives some credit to the script too. The editing, combined with the script was a pretty good combination. And the music really pulled it together (except for the foley, which, besides the sound of the waves crashing, was pretty bad). But where'd the find people to drag them around the world? How'd they pay for this without online banking? Crazy.

Some cons:

The continued use of phrases like "primitive" Africa, "poor little African boy," "being good africans they threw a few rocks," that stuff was bothersome. I guess I should just think of it as part of the times, and it was interesting that they were introducing surfing to these communities, but the cultural insensitivity was still a bit annoying. Like... shut up voice over. And I bet they probably didn't even think of the fact that the camera might not even be allowed in some of these countries and tribes. But it was made in the sixties. As was Breakfast At Tiffany's with their horrible spoof of a Chinese man. Yikes, 60s.

I mean, I just knew that in Africa we'd see some non-primative black people. But no. Every person they talked to and surfed with that wasn't one of these primitive Africans was a white dude. You just forget that there are so many white people in South Africa in the first place. And no Hawaii's surfing in Hawaii at all? Oh sixties.

Speaking of 60s, that sixties corny humor in the voice over was kind of funny. And the innocence of being bale to just hitch a ride without considering that you might be kidnapped or killed.

Watching endless footage of surfing reminds me of being friends with skaters in high school and watching endless and endless footage of skateboarding tricks, and super cool aerials and rad grinds, etc. Since I don't and have no idea how to surf, it's not very fun after the first 17.

This whole thing made me want to learn how to surf. I'm in the right place for it. Not the right season though.

Surfwise

I really liked it. It looked really great.. I liked how the story progressed. It was shot really well and, regardless of how stupid it sounds, I think the filmmakers really captured the sun.

What a crazy man attempting to raise his family in a mostly impossible and definitely crazy lifestyle. Clearly not one that could be maintained for longer than the children were children. For all his attempts at not being "attached to the physical world at all" during this time, it was interesting to see how much video footage and photographs they had from this period in their lives. A lot to base a documentary off of.

It was interesting to see his family go from a sort of idyllic sort of family cult lifestyle and transition into this sort of dark days towards the end as everybody went their separate ways. It was also interesting to see the perspective of the children. A lot of the older kids took the point of view of understanding how messed up the lifestyle was growing up and held a lot of animosity for their dad even to this day, but the younger kids, the kids born in the 70s seemed to be of the opinion that the lifestyle wasn't so bad and one of them was even thinking of "treating" his kids to the same kind of lifestyle, except on a boat. It's sort of like the old kids grew up with the truth, but the younger kids didn't have to experience all the bad. They came in during the decline of everything. The were born just as the older kids began wanting out of the lifestyle.

The filmmakers let the family go on the this long video diatribe, speaking with the sons and one daughter about what they missed out on. The fact that they couldn't go to medical school, they couldn't understand making monthly payments, they couldn't adjust and assimilate for a while, and then they come back to Doc, their dad, and he's babbling on and on about how no other child of God's earth got the opportunity that his kids got. "You only take what you need. If you take more than you need, then you're taking something from somebody else."