Review of North Shore (1987) by Karry D — 03 Apr 2009

The Karate Kid of the surfing culture.

Not a terribly complex movie, with many overtones of the generic heroic plot. If Joseph Campbell were alive I could see him forcing his grad students to watch this movie and write papers about the character arc.

Director William Phelps tries to capture a cross section of Hawaii during the 80s boon of non-locals arriving to surf the big waves. His attention to detail is much like the camera work for the time, loose, fuzzy, and often times out of frame. Randal Kleiser (director of the Blue Lagoon) wrote the story featuring a young Arizona boy who up till his trip to the big Island had never seen a real wave. Kleiser was at least cognizant of the truth, that is, Main land surfers who really arrived in Hawaii during the hey day often times found themselves attacked, in Phelps' light hearted 1987 summer movie fair, he at least attempts to show this. Overall the story is not King Lear, but it is entertaining and some of the art direction for the surfing is pretty good (nowhere near as good as surfing movies by surfers of the same time period).

The acting actually suffers for the writing, as the dialog is jilted and one sided, missing that direct interactive reality people who actually converse create. Tim McCanlies (writer of the Iron Giant) whom wrote the screenplay did an okay job of getting the feel of the much younger crowd than himself, but it's missing some elements that leave it feeling overly dated.

What it has: good overall feeling and narrative direction, that keeps the characters and plot moving. Along with a likable cast, including the the two dimensional villains/supporting cast and cameo's by famous surfers of the day.

What it's missing: Good camera work, realistic dialog and plot devices.

Overall, an entertaining flix, for a lazy Sunday afternoon's when getting to the beach to really surf isn't possible.