Gerry Lopez Movies

For nearly half a century, grassroots filmmakers Spyder Wills and Greg Weaver trekked around the world with their movie cameras, shooting now-legendary footage of one and only one subject: surfing. On multiple continents, with extraordinary cinematographic intimacy, Wills and Weaver captured nothing less than the evolution of this sport as it spread, slowly but definitively, around the world. And in time, helmers of both features and documentaries, such as John Milius (Big Wednesday), Larry Yates (The Forgotten Island of Santosha) and John Severson (Pacific Vibrations) began to turn to the Wills/Weaver image archive as a definitive resource of footage for use in their films. For quite some time, film historians regarded much of the pair's footage that went unused in the theatrically-released projects as permanently lost; recently, much of that rediscovered footage was recovered. It forms the backbone of Greg Schell's documentary Chasing the Lotus. Schell intercuts rare super-8 images shot by Weaver and Wills with recently-shot interviews and archival photographic stills chronicling the filmmakers' groundbreaking, decades-long creative journey that paved the way for much of our contemporary understanding and perception of surfing. Jeff Bridges narrates. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

Based on the true story of Carolyn Sapp, a Miss America pageant winner, this is a behind-the-scenes look not only at the goings-on of the pageant but also at the abusive relationship between Ms. Sapp and her boyfriend which led her to request police protection from him. ~ Tana Hobart, All Movie Guide

In this youthful surfing adventure, a hot young surfer wins a wave-tank contest in his native Arizona and decides to temporarily abandon his studies to hit the fantastic waves of the Hawaiian North shore pipeline. Once there, he is derided by the other surfers because nobody believes that a boy from the desert could possibly know anything about surfing real waves. Fortunately, an aging hippie (and supremo surfer), who designs boards for a living, believes in him and so teaches him the ropes. While learning about the sea and preparing for an international surfing competition, the boy also learns valuable lessons about life and love. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

John Milius's jingoistic direction and pulpy screenplay fit perfectly into this film version of the Robert E. Howard fantasy story of the sword and sorcery hero, Conan the Barbarian. Complementing Mulius's heavy metal production is Arnold Schwarzenegger's leaden acting, which in any other context would be deadly, but here (as in The Terminator) corresponds nicely with the whole sonorous project. The story begins when a horde of rampaging warriors massacre the parents of young Conan and enslave the young child for years on The Wheel of Pain. The Wheel of Pain seems to have as its only purpose the building up of Conan's muscles, so it's no surprise that one day Conan grows up to become Arnold Schwarzenegger. As the sole survivor of the childhood massacre, Conan is released from slavery and taught the ancient arts of fighting. Transforming himself into a killing machine, Conan travels into the wilderness to seek vengeance on Thulsa Doom (James Earl Jones), the man responsible for killing his family. In the wilderness, Conan takes up with the thieves Valeria (Sandahl Bergman) and Subota (Gerry Lopez). The trio comes upon a weird snake cult, linked to Doom, and Conan wants to trek off to Doom's mountain retreat to kill him. But he is prevented from doing that by King Osrik (Max Von Sydow), who wants the trio of warriors to help rescue his daughter who has joined Doom in the hills. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide