Review: The Endless Summer Chases the Perfect Surf Conditions Around the Globe
A documentary from 1966 offers a taste of summer, no matter the season.
When I'm trapped in New York City, and the February winds rattle the windows of my house, and the trees outside are bare, and even my wetsuit—which the 38-degree ocean feels somehow too cold for—lies fallow in the closet, I turn on The Endless Summer.
I don't need to tell you it's from 1966; you'll know by Bruce Brown's narration, alternatively corny and wry. The story this documentary tells is simple: Two young surfers, unwilling to enter California's cold winter waters, set off to find a place where it's warm even in the winter, a place where that elusive perfect wave might be hiding (all accompanied by The Sandals' iconic surf rock score).
They try Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, Hawaii, Senegal, Ghana, Nigeria, and South Africa. They are armed with heavy longboards—before anyone had board bags and leashes (which keep your board from getting too far away from you when you wipe out)—plus an atlas, a few pairs of board shorts, and a single Band-Aid in case of injury.
Today your average surfer can check Surfline, the website that tells you how waves are breaking in thousands of surf spots around the globe. You don't need an atlas: You have Google Maps. You can rent surfboards anywhere, and they come with leashes. You are, by and large, not stumbling across shark infestations or dangerous, shallow reef breaks—unless you intend to.
Watching this classic now reminds us: The world is so much more known than it used to be. The romanticism of a surf trip may be diminished. But the siren song surfers hear today is the same one that called The Endless Summer's protagonists all those years ago: We all just want to lose ourselves in a wave's perfection for a few seconds, letting everything else melt away.
