Pete Cole Movies
With the documentary Dogtown and Z-Boys, skater-cum-filmmaker Stacy Peralta introduced viewers to the history of the West Coast skateboarding culture and made a huge splash at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival, taking home both the Documentary Directing Award and the Documentary Audience Award. For this follow-up effort, Peralta leaves the land for the sea, focusing his lens on the world of surfing. Narrated by Sean Penn, just as Dogtown and Z-Boys was, Riding Giants attempts to trace the origins of surfing and also explore the growth and progress of surf culture. Among the surfing luminaries who chime in on topics varying from the business of the sport to "the big wave" are Laird Hamilton, Greg Noll, and Jeff Clark. Hoping to find the critical success akin to its predecessor, Riding Giants premiered at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Matthew Tobey, Rovi
- Starring:
- Sean Penn, Sam George, (more)
- 2000
"I don't think you can ever be too old to be stoked," claimed an interviewee in David L. Brown's documentary about geriatric surfers. The film focuses on ten life-long surfing enthusiasts, including some legends in the surfing world: Woody Brown, inventor of the catamaran, former Disney animator and 50-year surfing devotee Eve Fletcher, and "hot dog" pioneer Rabbit Kekai. Though many have admitted that they sacrificed careers and occasionally marriages for their all-consuming passion, all interviewed seem disarmingly spry, as if surfing is indeed the secret weapon against the aging process. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
