Waxploitation: Ten Ways Hollywood Got Surfing Right and Wrong

Oct 04 2006 / Los Angeles, CA

The Arabic saying: “I fight my brother, my brother and I fight my cousin, my brother, my cousin and I against the world,” also applies to surfers and it made for a great ending to Blue Crush. In the final at Pipeline, Anne Marie Chadwick is letting her fears get the best of her, sitting in the channel during a heat against Keala Kenneally. At some point, Keala Kennelly paddles over and sneers, “What are you doing!?” Then she talks the frightened haole girl into the lineup, where she snags a bomb, scores a 10 and makes the cover of Surfer Magazine.

While it is more than a little true that a lot of surfers have been known to indulge in everything from too many beers to heroin, there have also been some well known surfers who have accomplished great things with their brains. I mean just look at Sean Penn, right?

In Point Break Patrick Swayze played Bodhisattva, a psychobabbler who lead a crew of Merry Men who robbed banks wearing masks of ex-presidents.

While most surfers are law abiding citizens, Jack “Murph the Surf” Murphy lead a crew that robbed one of the world’s most precious and valuable gem collections from the American Museum of Natural History. They stole $410,000 [2005$2,500,000] worth of gems, flew to Miami but were in jail within 24 hours because their elaborate partying tipped off a bellhop. Murphy served only three years in prison and his heist was immortalized in the 1975 movie Murph the Surf.

PHOTO GALLERY    Check out Elvis and other Hollywood stars in the Waxploitation photo gallery. View Gallery> Related Stories - Ten Ways Hollywood Has Gotten Skateboarding Wrong - Adam Sandler Hits the Surf

During the 60s, Hollywood cast dark-haired crooners who didn’t surf as surfers who had the annoying habit of breaking into song in front of their girlfriends: James Darren as Moondoggie in Gidget, Fabian in Ride the Wild Surf and Frankie Avalon in all the Beach Blanket movies. Of all the dark-haired, non-surfing singers who played surfers the one who did it best was Elvis Presley. In Blue Hawaii (1961), The King plays Chad Gates, a kamaaina kid who gets out of the Army and returns to Hawaii to hang out in his shack play guitars and ukuleles and surf. Not only does Elvis sing Almost Always True to his moony wahine, he sings Can’t Help Falling in Love - to his grandmother!!!!

In Point Break, Special Agent Johnny Utah (Keanu Reeves) chases Bodhi (Patrick Swayze) around the world but knows where to find the bank robber: At Bells Beach, for the 50 Year Swell that Bodhi predicted two years ahead of time.

The best surf forecasters can predict a south swell just after a leopard seal farts in the Antarctic, or a grizzly bear growls in Kamchatka.  Surf forecasters have gotten better than ever at extrapolating the size and ETA of a swell from storms thousands of miles away. But the best surf forecasters work maybe two weeks ahead, at best, and not two years.

The surfer as thug is a cliche as current as Chris Won and Kala Alexander as the haole-hating local boys in Blue Crush. The role of the enforcer has been forced almost out of existence by a low tolerance to assault of any kind. Where punchouts and localism were common, in the 21^st Century the penalty for assault can make a DUI look like a parking ticket. Over the past 10 years, there have been cases of surfers in Palos Verdes and Ventura going to jail for more than nine months and/or paying fines in the tens of thousands of dollars for surf-related violence.

Ride the Wild Surf established the life or death ending in giant surf, which has been followed ever since. Big Wednesday ends with a giant day at Malibu, and In God’s Hands ends with the Mickey character drowning on a giant day at Jaws.  Blue Crush ends with a giant day at Pipeline, with wipeouts doubled by Rochelle Ballard. But the greatest of all Hollywood waxploitation wipeouts was done by Darrick Doerner for the big finish of Point Break. Doerner takes off on a giant wave at Waimea Bay, jumps off accidentally on purpose and bodysurfs to the bottom as a giant tube engulfs him. He did it without a scratch, a great waterman risking his life for another life and death ending in giant surf.

A surfer who puts their left foot forward is called a regular foot. Right foot forward is a goofy foot. Throughout the history of Waxploitation movies editors have regularly goofed this up. In Gidget they had both Linda Benson – a goofyfoot – and Mickey Munoz – a regularfoot – doubling for Gidget. In Point Break, Bodhi and all the surfing bank robbers were shown surfing facing the wave going both ways. Blue Crush managed to avoid making that mistake, probably because the director John Stockwell and producer Brian Grazer are both surfers which prevented the editors from putting both feet in their mouths – creatively speaking.

Is ocean water an aphrodisiac? Almost all Waxploitation movies involve some kind of love triangle, a combination of three men and/or three women driven sexually crazy by proximity to the wild surf. Gidget is a love triangle between Gidget, Moondoggie and the Great Kahoona. In Ride the Wild Surf,  Jody Wallis, Chase Colton and Steamer Lane make time with Brie Matthews, Augie Poole and Lily Kilua. The love affair between Frankie and Annette is an ongoing triangle. Big Wednesday is more about a triangle between three men – Matt, Jack and Leroy – and the same is true for In God’s Hands as Shane Daniels, Mickey McCormack and Keoni Jones go around the world chasing waves. Blue Crush cleverly reversed those clichés, with Anne Marie Chadwick, Lena and Eden making up a trio of women surfers who challenge the wild surf, while Matt Tolman and his football player friends stay on the beach, carrying the girl’s towels and ringing their hands.