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Surfwise: The Amazing True Odyssey of the Paskowitz Family
Release Date: 2008-07-29
Sales rank: 2701
Like many American outsider-adventurers Dorian Doc Paskowitz set out to realize a utopian dream. Abandoning a successful medical practice he sought self-fulfillment by taking up the nomadic life of a surfer. But unlike other American searchers like Thoreau or Kerouac Paskowitz took his wife and nine children along for the ride all eleven of them living in a 24 foot camper. Together they lived a life that would be unfathomable to most but enviable to anyone who ever relinquished their dreams to a straight job. The Paskowitz Family proved that America may be running out of frontiers but it hasn t run out of frontiersman.System Requirements:Running Time: 93 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/BIOGRAPHY Rating: R UPC: 876964000932 Manufacturer No: 10093 American history is filled with legendary characters who turned their backs on society, snubbing its conventions and opting for a simple, contemplative life. Like Thoreau. Kerouac. And.. Paskowitz? Well, actually, yeah. Surfwise, director Doug Pray’s 2007 documentary, tells the decidedly offbeat tale of Dorian "Doc" Paskowitz. Now in his mid-80s, the guy who calls himself "one of the few dumb Jewish doctors" was once on a big-time career track; a Stanford-educated physician, he was the head of the American Medical Association in Hawaii, an expert surfer, and a strong, handsome man who often donated his services and was asked to consider a run for governor of that state. But more than 50 years ago, Paskowitz and his third wife, Juliette (his previous marriages had failed due to his own "sexual ignorance"), essentially chucked it all for the sake of family, surfing, and precious little else. They had nine children, all but one of them boys, and the entire brood lived in a 24-foot camper, traveling constantly. Money? There was precious little of that (although years later the family generated some income by establishing a popular surf camp near San Diego). Food? They managed, with Paskowitz enforcing a strict organic regimen. School? "Education be damned," Doc said, and not one of the children ever attended classes regularly. To outsiders, it was an idyllic life; "we were not attached to the physical world at all," says one of the (now middle-aged) kids today. But the downside was deep. Crammed into their tiny space, the children watched and listened as their parents noisily made love every single night (not a great thing for the kids’ own later sex lives). Driven--and sometimes abused--by their ultra-controlling, narcissistic dad, they became excellent surfers but were ill-prepared for adult life when finally, in their 20s, some of them began to leave "home." Remarkably, they all seem relatively (so to speak) fine now, with real jobs in surfing, music, and the film business and a fairly clear perspective on their strange upbringing ("Don’t do anything a gorilla wouldn’t do" was one of Doc’s mantras). Extras include outtakes, commentary, surfing footage, and more. --Sam Graham |
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Step into Liquid
Release Date: 2004-04-20
Sales rank: 2338
Thanks to Dana Brown's delightful Step Into Liquid, the surfing scene in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, should get a healthy boost. That's because Brown, in the tradition of his father, filmmaker Bruce Brown (The Endless Summer), has captured dazzling images of surfers riding curls in some of the world's most exotic--and sometimes unlikely--places. Besides the action on Lake Michigan, Brown leads us to Costa Rica, where the sport's senior elite (including Summer star Robert August) prove they still have the moves, and Oahu's North Shore, where the legendary Pipeline inspires this quote: "It's so scary, maybe you die a little." Most entertaining is a segment in County Donegal, where the American Malloy brothers startle the locals and meet their Irish counterparts on the grayest ocean imaginable. Great personal stories here, including the tale of Northern California's Dale Webster, who has never missed a day on the waves in 30 years. --Tom Keogh |
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The Endless Summer
Release Date: 2000-05-23
Sales rank: 2290
The greatest surf movie ever made. "On any day of the year it is summer somewhere in the world..." Go with Robert August and Mike Hynson as they follow the summer season to Senegal, Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, Hawaii and California in search of the perfect wave. Still the ultimate surf film of all time!The definitive surf movie, this 1966 documentary by Bruce Brown is beautifully shot and thrilling to see in its portrait of youthful freedom on the world's shores. Brown followed two surfers around the globe in their quest for the perfect wave, finding it eventually on a remote beach far from home. The narration by "Big Kahuna Brown" cuts through the reverence a bit, being cheeky in tone. --Tom Keogh |
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Step Into Liquid [Blu-ray]
Release Date: 2008-06-24
Sales rank: 4941
Lionsgate Step Into Liquid (Blu-ray) From the makers of "The Endless Summer", "Step Into Liquid" takes us from the terrifying monstrous waves of Oahu's NorthShore to the Texas waters of the Gulf of Mexico to the shores of Ireland and Rapa Nui. Told throughthe voices of legends, pros, and everyday surfersalike, it is not just a film for surfers, but foranyone with an appreciation for sport and an inkling of what it means to be "stoked.".Thanks to Dana Brown's delightful Step Into Liquid, the surfing scene in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, should get a healthy boost. That's because Brown, in the tradition of his father, filmmaker Bruce Brown (The Endless Summer), has captured dazzling images of surfers riding curls in some of the world's most exotic--and sometimes unlikely--places. Besides the action on Lake Michigan, Brown leads us to Costa Rica, where the sport's senior elite (including Summer star Robert August) prove they still have the moves, and Oahu's North Shore, where the legendary Pipeline inspires this quote: "It's so scary, maybe you die a little." Most entertaining is a segment in County Donegal, where the American Malloy brothers startle the locals and meet their Irish counterparts on the grayest ocean imaginable. Great personal stories here, including the tale of Northern California's Dale Webster, who has never missed a day on the waves in 30 years. --Tom Keogh |
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Touching the Void
Release Date: 2004-06-15
Sales rank: 3496
From Oscar®-winning* director Kevin Macdonald comes a riveting true story a gripping white-knuckle (The Village Voice) adventure culminating in a cliffhanger a real one (Los Angeles Times)! After scaling the never-before-conquered 21000-foot Siula Grande mountain climbers Joe Simpson and Simon Yates face their greatest challenge yet: getting back down. But when Simpson shatters his leg in an awful fall and the friends are separated by a series of devastating mishaps their individual journeys become a voyage into extreme experience that should not be missed (New York Post)!System Requirements: Runnig Time 107 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. Rating: R UPC: 027616905260 Manufacturer No: 1006298To describe Touching the Void as a mountaineering documentary would be to do this breathtaking drama an injustice. By intercutting narration from the climbers themselves with a nail-biting reconstruction of their remarkable adventure in the Peruvian Andes, the film has the best of both genres: the authentic stamp of factual storytelling and the edge-of-the-seat tension of a dramatic movie. In 1985, two British mountaineers, Joe Simpson and Simon Yates, embarked on a daring--arguably reckless in the extreme--attempt to climb the previously unconquered mountain Siula Grande. A mixture of overconfidence in their own abilities and underestimation of the climb's difficulties brought them to grief after the successful slog to the summit. What follows is an often harrowing account of their perilous descent. Based on Joe Simpson's gripping book, the film boasts glorious widescreen photography of Siula Grande and its notorious glacier. Actors take the place of the two climbers for close-ups, though Simpson did return to Peru in order to reenact parts of his dreadful crawl back down the ice. The story of Simpson's almost-superhuman fortitude has become legendary in climbing circles, and even for viewers uninterested in mountaineering, Touching the Void is an astonishing slice of real-life drama, magnificently retold. --Mark Walker |
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Thicker Than Water
Release Date: 2003-11-25
Sales rank: 4283
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Dangerous Crossing (Fox Film Noir)
Release Date: 2008-03-11
Sales rank: 4602
Ruth Bowman (Jeanne Crain) is a new bribe glowing with delight as she and her charming new husband John (Carl Betz) set sail on the SS Monrovia for a transatlantic honeymoon. But when John inexplicably vanishes Ruth discovers that no one on the ship has any record of his existence! As she slips into hysteria Ruth has to prove that her marriage - and John's existence - is not just her own delusion. The ship's physician Dr. Paul Manning (Michael Rennie) might be the only person on board who can save Ruth from a terrifying predicament.System Requirements:Running Time: 75 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA/CLASSICS Rating: NR UPC: 024543446675 Manufacturer No: 2244667A relaxing cruise turns into a terrifying journey in Joseph M. Newman's Dangerous Crossing. Part of the Fox Film Noir series, Newman's classy B-movie plays more like a psychological thriller with some particularly atmospheric visuals (heavy on the studio-generated fog). As her honeymoon begins, newlywed Ruth Bowman (Jeanne Craine, Pinky) explores the ship while husband John (Carl Betz, The Donna Reed Show) runs an errand. On deck, a friendly divorcée warns Ruth, "You mustn't let him out of your sight--husbands can get lost so easily." (The familiar-looking sets were recycled from 1953's Titanic and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.) Hours later, John hasn't returned, and no one has seen him. Ruth’s inquiries uncover an empty room, a missing passport, and her spouse’s absence from the passenger list. All signs point to delusion. Ruth's plight brings her to the attention of Dr. Paul Manning (the elegant Michael Rennie, The Day the Earth Stood Still), who offers to help in any way he can. Though Ruth confesses to a brief bout with depression, there’s nothing else in her background to indicate instability, but that disclosure leads Manning to the real cause of her distress. Based on John Dickson Carr's 1943 radio play Cabin B-13 and shot in 19 days, Newman (This Island Earth) conjures up as much intrigue as Alfred Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes. The excellent extras include comprehensive commentary from Fox historian Aubrey Solomon, a short featurette (Peril at Sea: Charting a Dangerous Crossing), several stills galleries, and the original theatrical trailer. --Kathleen C. Fennessy |
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Riding Giants (Special Edition)
Release Date: 2005-01-04
Sales rank: 5119
From its early Hawaiian roots to its current status as a recreational lifestyle enjoyed worldwide, bigwave surfing is given the definitive exploration by acclaimed director Stacy Peralta (Dogtown and Z-Boys).Riding Giants is more than another blissful surfing movie. It's an outstanding documentary about one era in American alternative lifestyles, when surfing was well-suited to a radical culture of social dropouts. Using an amazing array of amateur film clips, shot for the most part in Hawaii and California from the late 1950s and early '60s, director Stacy Peralta traces the rise of surfing's appeal to young men looking to test themselves in an unorthodox (and sexy) milieu--of "living life to the fullest," as former surfer-turned-screenwriter John Milius (Big Wednesday) puts it at one point. Lengthy chapters on the glories of Oahu's Makaha and the "superstition and dread" that accompanied the big-wave challenge of Waimea Bay are riveting and sometimes heroic, particularly told through the memories of surf legend Greg Noll. Great material, too, about the deadly wonders of surfing Mavericks, California, where the rocks will get one if the violent tides don't. --Tom Keogh |
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Battleship Potemkin (The Ultimate Edition) (2pc) (Full B&W)
Release Date: 2007-10-23
Sales rank: 6861
For eight decades, Sergei Eisenstein s 1925 masterpiece has remained the most influential silent film of all time. Yet each successive generation has seen BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN subjected to censorship and recutting, its unforgettable power diluted in unauthorized public domain editions from dubious sources. Until now. Kino is proud to join the Deutsche Kinematek in association with Russia s Goskinofilm, the British Film Institute, Bundesfilm Archive Berlin, and the Munich Film Museum in presenting this all new HD Transfered restoration of BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN. Dozens of missing shots have been replaced, and all 146 title cards restored to Eisenstein s specifications. Edmund Meisel s definitive 1926 score, magnificently rendered by the 55-piece Deutches Filmorchestra in 5.1 Stereo Surround, returns Eisenstein s masterwork to a form as close to its creator s bold vision as has been seen since the film s triumphant 1925 Moscow premiere. Odessa 1905. Enraged with the deplorable conditions on board the armored cruiser Potemkin, the ship s loyal crew contemplates the unthinkable mutiny. Seizing control of the Potemkin and raising the red flag of revolution, the sailors revolt becomes the rallying point for a Russian populace ground under the boot heels of the Czar s Cossacks. When ruthless White Russian cavalry arrives to crush the rebellion on the sandstone Odessa Steps, the most famous and most quoted film sequence in cinema history is born.Sergei Eisenstein's revolutionary sophomore feature has so long stood as a textbook example of montage editing that many have forgotten what an invigoratingly cinematic experience he created. A 20th-anniversary tribute to the 1905 revolution, Eisenstein portrays the revolt in microcosm with a dramatization of the real-life mutiny aboard the battleship Potemkin. The story tells a familiar party-line message of the oppressed working class (in this case the enlisted sailors) banding together to overthrow their oppressors (the ship's officers), led by proto-revolutionary Vakulinchuk. When he dies in the shipboard struggle the crew lays his body to rest on the pier, a moody, moving scene where the citizens of Odessa slowly emerge from the fog to pay their respects. As the crowd grows Eisenstein turns the tenor from mourning a fallen comrade to celebrating the collective achievement. The government responds by sending soldiers and ships to deal with the mutinous crew and the supportive townspeople, which climaxes in the justly famous (and often imitated and parodied) Odessa Steps massacre. Eisenstein edits carefully orchestrated motions within the frame to create broad swaths of movement, shots of varying length to build the rhythm, close-ups for perspective and shock effect, and symbolic imagery for commentary, all to create one of the most cinematically exciting sequences in film history. Eisenstein's film is Marxist propaganda to be sure, but the power of this masterpiece lies not in its preaching but its poetry. --Sean Axmaker |
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Billabong Odyssey
Release Date: 2004-01-27
Sales rank: 9256
An extreme sports adventure! Top professional surfers scour the world's oceans to ride the biggest waves on the planet. Experience the thrills and spills of action-packed big wave surfing.Running Time: 92 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: SPORTS/GAMES UPC: 085393431921In addition to boasting one of the most astonishing opening sequences in the history of extreme-sports filmmaking, Billabong Odyssey offers a breathtaking survey of big-wave surfing at a pivotal stage in its evolution. With the advent of Jet-Ski Waverunners used for "tow-in" access to gigantic waves that paddle-surfers could never reach, this three-year, globe-trotting quest for the world's biggest waves is nothing less than spectacular. As documentaries go it's a bit cruder than 2003's other surfing movie, Step Into Liquid, and many of the same world-class surfers appear in both films (including 49-year-old Ken Bradshaw, still going strong). But Billabong is unrivaled in its abundance of jaw-dropping footage--most of it shot from helicopters hovering in close proximity--showing the sheer, terrifying scale of breaking "tubes"--some reaching 100 feet--at the most challenging big-wave locations on the planet, including Maverick's at Santa Cruz, California; Cortes Bank off the Pacific Coast; "Cyclops" in Australia; Mundaka, Spain; and the treacherous "Jaws" reef on the coast of Maui, Hawaii. While touching on various hot topics such as safety training, serious wipe-outs, swell-tracking technology, female surfers (like the great Layne Beachley), and hydrofoil surfboards (billed as "the future of the sport"), director Philip Boston applies a casual, competitive structure that's too diffuse and lightweight to have much impact. But when the film focuses on the climactic "Jaws" showdown between Carlos Burle and Mike Parsons, Billabong Odyssey achieves a state of raw power and spiritual intensity, culminating in Parsons' best-ever 10-point ride on a massive tube that constantly threatens to consume him. As dozens of adrenaline-junkie surfers strive for new horizons of unprecedented skill, Billabong Odyssey chronicles their efforts with amazing bird's-eye cinematography. For surfers and non-surfers alike, this movie must be seen to be believed. --Jeff Shannon |
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