Step Into Liquid (2003)

“No special effects, no stuntmen, no stereotypes.” As these opening title-declarations suggest, Dana Brown’s surfing documentary, Step Into Liquid, is nothing if not earnest. It is also magnificent to behold, slightly rambling, and prone to prosaic observations: surfers are a “tribe of people,” “the stoke is a global thing,” and of course, surfing is not a lifestyle, but “a life.”

And another thing: that whole slacker-stoner-dude business, the Spicoli thing, is tired. In Step Into Liquid, surfers are cool. They step into another world, without defined edges and awkward angles. They have a sense of mission, or at least an understanding of why they take the risk — “the moment when the impossible is conquered.” The seriousness of the risk is indicated in a segment on Jesse Billauer, who broke his neck surfing 5 years ago, and still surfs. That he pursues the thrill of surfing, the freedom it represents and allows him to feel, despite this, is a testament to the sport, but also to this young man’s determination, and his friends’ commitment to him.

Thanks to incredible camerawork by John-Paul Beeghly and his crew, you begin to get a sense of what this means: repeated shots of huge (“gimungous”) curling waves, riders crouching “in the tube,” “wave dancing,” and, in the case of Australia’s phenomenal Taj Burrow (deemed “the future” of surfing), evincing joyous creativity — hotdogging on water.

The film also journeys to locations where less than ideal weather conditions inspire innovation. Where Tahiti’s Teahupo’o offers “waves with teeth,” and lots of blue sky, or Hawaii’s North Shore gorgeous green-blue waters, other situations are less obviously exhilarating. You know the surfers are dedicated in the brown waters of Lake Michigan in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, or chasing tanker wakes in Galveston, Texas shipping lanes. A Vietnam War vet takes his teenaged son with him to Danang, where they find a stanch surf club of ten members and lame waves; they eventually resort to surfing sand dunes. A cloying episode follows the brothers Mallory, Irish-Americans who surf in the frigid waters off County Donegal, and spend a day teaching Protestant and Catholic kids to board.

The stunning Southern California surf is, of course, familiar surfer-doc territory, displayed in loving detail by earlier films to which Dana Brown pays appropriate tribute, with footage from his dad Bruce Brown’s The Endless Summer (1966) and The Endless Summer 2 (1994, made as a collaboration between father and son), as well as new shots of Robert August, now surfing with his son Sam, and Robert “Wingnut” Weaver. (Bruce also appears as an enthusiastic talking head, with the caption “Academy Award nominee.”) Updating the previous films, Step Into Liquid also includes a brief section on women stars — Keala Kennelly, Rochelle Ballard, and Layne Beachley — who note the pleasure of surfing amid estrogen instead of testosterone.

Frankly, more integration looks like a good idea, in that life that’s not a lifestyle and in the film’s structure. The sections organization is occasionally clunky and provides what appears a superficial look at various aspects, from the boy-girl split to the general whiteness of the sport (at least in this film) to the loss of exclusiveness that comes with mainstreaming (here the breaking point is 1959’s Gidget, after which the numbers of recreational surfers jumped from the thousands into the millions) as well as the lack of U.S. sports coverage; in Australia, where U.S.-born six-time world champion Kelly Slater is all over primetime.

The film doesn’t precisely engage the more difficult questions it raises concerning the intersections and potential conflicts between devotion to surfing and cashing in on it. And perhaps it can’t, as by its nature, it is delivering the beauty of surfing, as well as some images of comic, charismatic, and eccentric devotees, in a commercial format. The way to get surfing better “appreciated” is to make it better know, or better publicized. But, as every subculture that eventually struggles to make sense of mainstream attention demonstrates, sometimes the line between selling out and making clear isn’t so visible or easy to maintain. Sometimes, the line just blurs, and then you have to figure out how to cope.

Of course, numerous surfers do it for a living as well as out of love — and they need gear and clothing endorsements and video contracts. As Step Into Liquid shows, many of these professionals follow the World Cup Tour for nine months out of the year. Happily, and fittingly, even these guys can still be awed. In Santa Cruz, the film introduces the rowdy Mavericks Crew, with nicknames — Peter “Condor” Mel, Ken “Skindog” Collins, Darrel “Flea” Viristko, and Shawn “Barney” Collins (so named because, well, he’s just a “Barney”).

At film’s end, Condor and Skindog hook up with members of the Strapped Crew, Laird Hamilton and Dave Kalama, big wave tow-in surfers from Hawaii’s North Shore. They travel to Rapa Nui where conditions are only conducive to surfing “once in a lifetime.” They take a boat to an area 100 miles off shore, where they find 60-foot waves. There’s no way around it: they do take your breath away.