Riding Giants

The story of big wave riding begins long before the sport became one of the world's most potent symbols of youth, romance, adventure and freedom. But in sharp contrast to surfing's vital, contemporary appeal is its history -- which goes back much further than the Beach Boys and "Surfin' U.S.A." In fact, surfing is an ancient sport, tracing its origins back over 1500 years to ancient Polynesia. This is where RIDING GIANTS begins, taking us from surfing's early Polynesian roots to its rebirth in the early 20th century to the development of a fledgling surf culture along the coast of Southern California in the 1940s. A hybrid archetype that blended one part Polynesian waterman, one part American frontiersman and one part Peter Pan, by the late 1940s surfers soon found themselves at the cultural vanguard, kinetic Beat poets before Kerouac, hippies before Haight Ashbury, adventure athletes before the X-Games. And then there are the big wave surfers and, as RIDING GIANTS shows, they are something else entirely.

Director Stacy Peralta will conduct Q&A's after the 7:35 p.m. screenings on July 24 and 25 at the Monica 4-Plex in Santa Monica.

"It may take willpower not to run directly from the theater down to the nearest shoreline, just for a whiff of whatever saltwater magic sauce the big-wave stars featured in Peralta's vibrant docu are on." -- Lisa Schwarzbaum, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY

  "Peralta has become a more relaxed filmmaker, and when he trusts the haunting sight of a giant wave breaking to speak for itself, the movie reaches the sublime heights of its subject." -- Benjamin Strong, VILLAGE VOICE