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Surfer: Teen Confronts Fear Review
Loading...Surfer: Teen Confronts Fear Review
Sage Burke– Sage
Douglas Burke– Father of Surfer
Gerald James– Captain “Banks” Bancroft, MD
Alex Angelikis– Sgt. Marks
Directed by Douglas Burke
Screenplay by Douglas Burke
Distributed by Burke International Pictures
Rated PG for thematic material including some unsettling images and brief language
Runtime– 98 minutes
Surfer: Teen Confronts Fear, written and directed by and featuring Douglas Burke, is one of the most bizarre movies I think I’ve ever seen. It’s heartfelt, in a way, and Burke clearly has some sort of message he wants to convey through Surfer, but I’ll be damned if I know what it is. It’s the kind of movie you don’t really want to watch multiple times but will probably have to watch multiple times in order to understand it. You know, if you’re really, really, really dedicated to figuring it out.
The movie stars Sage Burke as Sage, a teen surfer who, after a traumatic surfing experience, is afraid to go into the water. After cutting some squid for bait for fishing (Sage is afraid to go into the water but he has no problem standing near the water and fishing), a man washes up on shore. Sage doesn’t know who this man is but the man knows who Sage is. In fact, the man, played by Douglas Burke, claims to be Sage’s father. Sage doesn’t believe him, but after a flashback to when Sage was a little kid, suddenly Sage believes him. They then walk on the beach and decide to hang out in this little cave thing where, for the next half hour or so, Sage and his father talk. And talk, And talk. At first, it’s all about Sage’s fear of dying in the ocean. Then, I guess, the conversation is all about overcoming/understanding that fear. While this is happening, Sage’s father starts puking some weird black bile stuff that seems to mean that he’s dying. See, Sage’s father claims to be an angel or some bullshit spirit that made a deal to be human for a little while so he could talk to his son about fear, and the bile is his new, temporary human body breaking down.
Now, while all of that is going on, we see surfing footage of people catching waves, actually surfing, and then wiping out. This footage, on occasion, shifts ever so briefly into slow motion for absolutely no reason. Again, this goes on for like half an hour before Sage’s father “dies” and Sage has to roll him into the water. However, before his father “dies,” he tells Sage to go see “Banks.” Who the hell is Banks?
Banks is Captain Bancroft, a Navy doctor who seems to know all about Sage and his father. Apparently, Sage’s father used to be a badass Navy SEAL back in the day and that’s how Banks hooked up with him. So Sage goes to see Banks, who operates some sort of secret government/military hospital on some street in the middle of a west coast city. After a “walk around and check the cars on the street for, I guess, bombs and shit” interlude with two hospital security guards (one of them is Sgt. Marks, played by Alex Angelikis), Sage is allowed to talk to Banks, and suddenly, in that moment, Sage finds out that his father isn’t dead.
No, Sage’s father is a patient in the Navy hospital Banks runs, and he’s been incapacitated for years on end. If that’s the case, why didn’t Sage know this (why was he told his father was dead?) and what the hell is wrong with Sage’s father anyway? Sage watches his father have some sort of seizure meltdown that causes a Coke bottle on a table to fall over and then, mysteriously, reappear completely unscathed in the next scene. What the hell is going on here?
Sage then talks to some guy about white blood cells in the hand and killing, and suddenly Sage is ready to face his fears and go back into the water. The rest of the movie is a series of montages where we see Sage get a new surfboard (Sage watches the surfboard maker make the board, using a sander and wearing a mask the whole time. Sage doesn’t wear a mask despite being a foot or so from what the surfboard maker is doing), Sage goes to some temple where he attempts to withstand multiple giant bug attacks, and the he does some weight and strength training before going back into the water. And then Sage goes back into the water, and the rest of the movie is surfing footage.
And that, in a nutshell, as far as I can tell, is Surfer: Teen Confronts Fear. I’m even more confused now than I was before writing about it.
Why was this movie made? Is it meant to be a cinematic explanation of Douglas Burke’s personal life philosophy? I guess it could be. If it is, that would explain the half hour “examination” of fear. But then how does one explain the sort of supernatural aspect of the story and then the whole Navy SEAL thing? What does any of that have to do with anything? Why isn’t the movie solely about the ghost of Sage’s father egging him on to get back into the water?
And then there’s the whole military hospital section of the movie. Why is there a secret military hospital in the middle of a city’s business district, on Main Street? How does that even happen? And how often do people sit in front of a green screen giant Navy battleship? Because that happens in this movie.
Perhaps I’m not smart enough to “get” what this movie is meant to be about. Perhaps I’m not “in touch” enough with my spiritual side to grasp at what Douglas Burke is trying to do here. I mean, should I take some drugs before watching this again? Will that open up my mind enough to see what I’m missing? I don’t know. Maybe?
Now, the surfing footage, when it doesn’t go into slow motion for no reason at all, is decent looking, from a static camera from a certain distance away kind of way. And some of the music is okay. Gerald James, as the Navy doctor, somehow manages to keep a straight face throughout the whole thing, and for that he should be commended. He’s in the movie but I doubt he understands what the hell is going on.
Douglas Burke is fully committed to his performance, both as the bile spewing ocean angel that likes to describe himself as “hard jelly,” and as the thoroughly damaged human being in the military hospital. The bit where he has a seizure and then starts writhing around on the ground is a tour de force experience that comes out of nowhere (this is also where the mystery of the Coke bottle comes in). As a director, he’s either shockingly incompetent and absolutely clueless about what he’s doing, or he’s operating on a higher plane of understanding that we will never understand because we’re not on his intellectual or spiritual level.
And then there’s poor Sage Burke. He is like the audience, thoroughly confused about what is going on and likely just going through the motions because, well, what the hell else is he going to do? He does seem to be having fun in the surfing scenes, so at least he has that going for him.
If you look around the internets for this movie you’ll see it described as similar to Tommy Wiseau’s The Room. I don’t know if it’s as “good”/insane as that movie, but it’s probably right to say that Surfer is a peer of The Rom. It’s sort of in the same genre. Sort of.
Surfer: Teen Confronts Fear is a movie that you should experience at least once in your life, just to see if you can figure it out. It isn’t any good, but at the same time, it does have heart and ambition. That can be interesting. If you’re in the mood to watch or experience that kind of thing.
Maybe.
Surfer: Teen Confronts Fear. Try to figure out what the hell it’s about. Experience it.
So what do we have here?
Dead bodies: None.
Undead bodies: Maybe 1. It depends on how you take the first part of the movie.
Explosions: None.
Nudity?: None.
Doobage:A voice over, squid cutting, still photos of surfers cut with more squid cutting, fishing, a man washes up on the shore, a garbage can that gets pulled into the water, some really awkward body carrying, talk of a dream, flashback hooey, philosophy, a flashback to young people surfing, surfing footage that occasionally goes into slow motion for absolutely no reason, black bile barfing, more surfing footage, talk of being in the barrel of a wave, a dead whale, book reading, attempted hair touching, a woman named Miss Washington, a military building that’s on main street in some west coast town, a full on street search for, I guess, bombs or some shit, an emotional breakdown, a freakout seizure, a Coke bottle, a training montage, running underwater while carrying weights, white blood cells in the hand, apple eating, more training with a giant bug attack, even more surfing, a brown surfboard, and even more and more surfing, followed by an American flag being folded.
Kim Richards?: It almost happened off screen.
Gratuitous: A flag waving in slow motion, Douglas Burke, a voice over, squid cutting, “follow my finger,” hard jelly, a sea lion, Adam and Eve, talking about the formation of the world, surfing footage that goes into slow motion for absolutely no reason, blood pressure, a giant blown up news article that’s hung on the wall but the picture on it is blurred out, military lingo, watching syncing, spoon in the mouth, green screen of a Navy battleship, surfboard construction, and surfing.
Best lines: “The fear is still stuck deep inside me and I can’t let it out,” “It’s okay. I can see. Thank you,” “This is just like a hard jelly. Feel it!,” “Now I know why they don’t let you do this,” “Now do you believe me?,” “There is no shame in being afraid,” “Just let your whole identity melt into the ocean,” “I feel really dizzy and sick,” “Movement! Movement is important!,” “What is the trick to the big waves?,” “Dad, where does the feeling start?,” “Come into the dream! Hear the sound!,” “It’s all still happening inside,” “Oooh! Your heart sounds good,” “It looks like everything is happening just fine,” “I can’t tell them what actually happened,” “I’m here to see Banks,” “What are you clowns eating?,” “Get this guy a Coke,” “Dad. My name is Sage,” “This is your Dad,” “It doesn’t make sense. Life doesn’t make sense,” and “You know, I always wanted a son.”
