I was on Hulu earlier this week and discovered a category of surf movies; I nearly had an aneurysm. I decided that now was a great time to start a limited run serial on surf movies, and now I present to you Surf Movie Sunday, with no promises of how long it will last but I will watch a different surf movie every Sunday and then post a short description with a general review with a rating of some sort that I will determine by the time I am done with this one. Sorry it’s going up so late, even if you read this the moment I post it there’s a pretty good chance it’s already Monday where you are. I have had nothing but bad luck

I had to do Bruce Brown’s The Endless Summer first, because it is considered to be the seminal surf movie. In this 1966 documentary, Brown follows two California surfers on the “endless summer”, a journey across the world, following the summer season and trying to find waves wherever they went. These two surfers hit Senegal, Ghana, South Africa, East Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, and Hawaii, finding new surf spots and meeting new people, having adventures, and spreading their love of surfing across the world. This is the film that inspired future generations of surfers to do the same, and brought surfing to these new places later on.

The plot description doesn’t do this film justice, however. From the surf music theme and the Disney-esque incidental music, to the wisecrack-laden narration that kept us laughing through most of the movie, this film serves as both an education in what surfing looks like and an inspiration to go find some waves and see what you can do on them; certain points of the narration feel like you’re gleaning important pointers, too – Brown talks about how surfers deal with shallow surf, vertical corals, waves that break against a wall, waves that come in diagonally to the shore (I think if you start on the near end you can ride pretty far out), et cetera.

I felt this movie was so worth my while I kept it in the queue because I want to see it again. In other words, I give this movie . . .

FIVE SURFS UP!

I can’t recommend this movie highly enough. The narration is wonderfully humorous, the surfing is real, the movie was over before we knew it. Even more to it’s credit, the wife enjoyed it and laughed right along with me and found it very interesting, so crazy-surf-otaku-Rob is not leading you up the primrose path, I promise! If you subscribe to Hulu Plus or Amazon Prime, you are in luck – The Endless Summer is available on both right now. Sorry Netflix subscribers, you got left in the cold.

If you subscribe to a service that offers this film or know how to otherwise see this movie for free (legally) then please let us know it the comments below.