New Surf Movie "Bustin Down The Door" Chronicles the lively 70's pro surfing scene
Bustin' Down the Door is going to be a super rad surf flick.
Before pro surfing found it's way, there were some super maverick pioneers that forced their vision for aggressive surfing coupled with a rock-star thirst for fame onto the surfing scene. This was well before there was actual money in the sport, so these guys were pioneering an underground culture and threading the needle between big, life-threatening waves, horny girls, drugs, and tropical diseases like malaria to forge what is currently pro-surfing today. This is going to be a hooot.
The Full Transcript is here:
By the early 1970's the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii was already established as the world's ultimate surfing Mecca. It was a true proving ground for any surfer who wanted to play on the main stage. Every winter, the best surfers in the world converged on the North Shore to test their skills in the most radical waves known to m but it was also a cultural crossroads, a melting pot of surfers and stoners where weirdness was the norm. The lawless atmosphere, consisting of gangs and drugs and hippies and surfboards, was often described as 'the wild west'. This is where humble beginnings of a professional sport were born.
Enter a brash young crew of Australian and South African surfers who had a vision for a sport that was barely yet defined as such. The young crew was made up of six individuals: Wayne "Rabbit" Bartholomew, Peter Townend, Mark Richards, and Ian Cairns, (all from Australia) and Shaun Tomson and Michael Tomson (Cousins from South Africa). The six surfers came from world-class home surf breaks where they had been honing their aggressive skills since childhood. Individually, each surfer possessed unique styles that were in stark contrast to the cruisy, nonchalant styles of the top surfers at that time. Collectively, they represented a new generation of innovative surfers who were hell bent on replacing Hawaiian surf kings like Barry Kanaiaupuni, Reno Abellira, Jeff Hakman, and Gerry Lopez as the leaders of the sport.
The only problem was, well..nobody knew who these kids were. So they had to take some risks to get their names recognized. The only way they knew how was to surf aggressively with reckless abandon in hopes of catching the eye of one of the few surf photographers prowling the beaches looking for the next cover shot. Their plan was correct. By the end of the '74 season, the kids were on the map. They didn't win any contests (or get invited, for that matter), but their names were out there and people were starting to take notice.
Fast forward to the '75 season. Non only did the crew get invites to ALL the contests, but the proceeded to sweep them in grand fashion. They also brought a sense of professionalism they hoped would establish surfing as a legitimate sport, complete with sponsors, paychecks and big name stars. There was a focus, intensity and drive with this group that had been missing in the sport since it's inception. There was also a sense of entitlement and braggadocio that riled up resentment among the locals who called the North Shore their home.
Between the '75 and '76 season, things really took off. The crew was seen as heroes in their home countries. Newspaper and magazine articles declared them as Kings of surfing. The crew even went as far as to declare themselves #1, most notably in an article penned by Rabbit titled, "Bustin' Down The Door". The Hawaiians and North Shore locals were enraged. When Rabbit arrived early that next winter, he certainly didn't receive the fanfare he had grown accustomed to.
The boastful articles from the previous year had the locals boiling, and they finally had someone to release some steam on. What was supposed to be a victorious and celebratory season quickly devolved into months filled with death threats and violence. Nearly every member of the 'crew' ran into their share of conflict. Rabbit had his teeth knocked out and was almost drowned, and most of the crew received death threats and were banned from surfing the North Shore. Whatever momentum had been built the year before was promptly erased. The dream of being professional surfers was crumbling right before their eyes.
However, after a large scale meeting, a peace treaty was made with the help of surfing legend Eddie Aikau and his family. After a reconciliation, the Australians and South Africans were allowed to surf freely on the North Shore again. At the same time, plans were being drawn up for an organized world tour that would eventually crown surfing's first TRUE champion. Over the course of the next seven years, the crew maintained an unparalleled dominance over the sport. Peter Townend, Rabbit Bartholomew, Shaun Tomson and Mark Richards were professional surfing's first world champions.
Through all of it's trials and tribulations, surfing found it's footing and started an unprecedented rise through pop culture. The emergence of a multi-billion dollar industry over the next two decades, as well as an exotic world tour that visits the best surf breaks on the planet, watched by millions via TV and the Internet, can be directly attributed to the surfers who put everything on the line to pioneer the sport. "Bustin' Down The Door" is their story, told through the eyes and words of those who lived it.
This should be very entertaining.
Aloha
Noserider.
