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As I mentioned in my short review of 'Step Into Liquid' the other day, I borrowed five surf vids and I've had them running almost constantly this week. I didn't realize it when I borrowed them, but they span the decades from the '30s to the '90s.
The earliest footage is from 'Doc Ball: Surfing's Legendary Lensman,' by Carl Ackerman. It chronicles Ball's early videography from when he founded the Palos Verdes Surf Club in the '30s, and contains lots of footage from that era, interspersed with interviews of the man himself a few years ago. He's a funny guy, and a surf photography pioneer. I'd seen him skateboarding at age 92 at the end of 'Surfing For Life,' and this video also has a nice section at the end with him rolling down a long, gradual hill and obviously loving it. Great scene.
Then there's Walt Phillips' 'Psyche Out,' from 1962. The funniest thing about this one is the beat-poetry narration, so appropriate for the period. Big and small wave-riding in Hawaii and California, featuring Mike Doyle, Jack O'Neill, Lance Carson, Phil Edwards, Donald Takayama and others.
Next up was something called 'Surf Shorts,' which has four 10 - 20 minutes videos, three of them shot by Hal Jepsen. It starts off with a big-wave video called 'Wild Surf,' by Ohrant Roloff (?), from the '60s, followed by Jepsen's coverage of the Word Surf Championships in 1972 in SD, and then coverage of an ill-fated Atlantic contest during the '70s at Cape Hatteras, when they couldn't figure out where to go to catch the wind swell from a LPS moving offshore. There's lots of discussion about whether they should surf, or just turn it into a promotional tour for their sponsors. I forget what the last one is about.
'The Runman Video' is a classic from the mid-'80s. It has a great soundtrack and surfing by Cheyne Horan, Tom Curren, Martin Potter and others. The little skits scattered throughout are kind of stupid, but the Ronald Reagan mask was funny. Ends with Dead Kennedys 'Holiday in Cambodia,' and any video with the DKs on the soundtrack is OK by me!
Finally, 'Lost Across America, Vol. I,' a very nice compilation of late-'90s surfing from coast-to-coast and Hawaii.
All of these are worth a look if you can find them or rent them. They've been getting me stoked as the local forecasts predict an end to the flat spell we've had over the past two weeks.
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