Summer’s Winding Down …

August 28, 2003

… so the it’s pretty much a dumping ground for mainstream movies. Luckily there’s still some independent films floating around.

About a month ago I caught Step Into Liquid, the surf documentary from the SON of the king of surf docs. Turns out Dana Brown’s got a bigger bag of tricks that Endless Summer dad Bruce. Instead of recycling the quest for the perfect wave that is the staple of every surf movie, Brown goes far and wide to find how surfer’s get their stoke, from the tiniest swells of Lake Michigan to the seventy foot monstrosities of Cortez Banks. There seems to be an endless supply of breathtaking footage, and it’s well worth catching on the big screen. Oddest feeling? Watching Cortez Banks and realizing the actual wave is probably 3-4 times the size of the movie screen. Whoa.

The only other thing I watched recently was the hilarious American Splendor, the biopic of the underground comic artist Harvey Pekar. The performances all around are wonderful, anchored by the twitchy Paul Giamatti as Pekar. The movie departs from the standard format by incorporating Pekar himself in short documentary bits, as well as the voiceover. Surprisingly, it’s not very distracting, and everything comes together really well.

For people unfamiliar with Pekar, I think Splendor’s a real revelation. For hardcore Pekarheads, I think it might play a bit too soft and too grand. Instead of reveling in the little things, it covers Pekar’s life on a pretty big scale (success, love, triumph over adversity). I didn’t really mind that very much though, I was too busy laughing and shaking my head incredulously at scene-stealing “Geniune Nerd’ Toby.

Posted in Moving Pictures