Posted on: Friday, July 9, 2004

MOVIE REVIEW
Footage is real star of 'Riding Giants'

By Christy LeMire
Associated Press Entertainment Writer

Surf legends Duke Kahanamoku and Greg Noll in an image from "Riding Giants," a documentary opening today. Sony Pictures Classics

The hyperbole is as bodacious as the 50-footers themselves in "Riding Giants," Stacy Peralta's documentary on the history of big-wave surfing.

The film is Peralta's follow-up to "Dogtown and Z-Boys" from 2001, about the rad Southern California skater dudes who defined the sport in the 1970s.

As a skateboarder and surfer himself, the director obviously has a deep fondness and respect for both subjects, which are inextricably entwined.

And as in his first film, he entertainingly combines spectacular ocean footage, archival photographs and interviews, and connects them with an awesome, eclectic soundtrack including Dick Dale, the Stray Cats, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam and, in its more peaceful moments, Moby.

But "Riding Giants," which as a whole is more peaceful than its predecessor, also lacks that film's sense of context. The Z-Boys of "Dogtown," most of whom came from broken homes, skated out of rebellion. They were punk rockers, and their boards were their instruments.

The guys in "Riding Giants," who still wear deep tans under their Hawaiian shirts, gleefully toss around such words as "gnarly" and "radical" decades after catching their first wave. That's all they are, though — words.

The biggest stars in the history of big-wave surfing — including the burly Greg Noll, the adventurous Jeff Clark and the buffed, towheaded Laird Hamilton, today's most dominant extreme surfer — can describe how they traveled to a hidden, intimidating nook of Hawai'i's North Shore, or paddled two hours off the coast of Northern California just to ride colossal waves that could potentially hurl them against deadly, jagged rocks.

Aside from hearing about "the greatest spot ever," "the greatest wave ever" and "the greatest ride ever," though, we never really understand why.

Noll, who pioneered big-wave riding in the 1950s and '60s and became a surfboard designer himself, comes closest to a definition when he describes his affinity for the sport as a "full-on love affair that took place for 25 years."

Mostly, though — despite their obvious dedication, creativity and athleticism — these guys come off as beach bums. One of them rhapsodizes about the youthful memory of having "no watch, no money, no car, no nothing. Just shorts and a T-shirt."

And the word "guys" keeps popping up because that's who Peralta focuses on almost exclusively. The introduction of Gidget, the perky surfer girl played on screen by Sandra Dee and on TV by Sally Field, is viewed as nothing but a nuisance because she brought surfing to the masses and inspired unrealistic movies such as 1964's "Ride the Wild Surf," starring Fabian and Tab Hunter.

"It just makes me puke," Noll proclaims at the recollection of such wannabes.

It takes about an hour for Peralta to introduce a woman — current surfer Sarah Gerhardt — but we never see her in action in the water, and we don't get the kind of thorough back story we get for the men.

The evocative surfing footage itself, both old and new, is the real star, though. And even though we repeatedly see the most daring surfers "battle some humongous waves" — to quote Jeff Spicoli in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" — it never gets boring, and we never feel wiped out.

"Riding Giants," a Sony Pictures Classics release, is rated PG-13 for brief strong language. Running time: 101 minutes. Three stars out of four.