A First timer’s Appreciation – OC Weekly
A First-Timer’s Appreciation of the Surfing Classic The Endless Summer
I was 16 when the first Star Wars movie was released, which would seem to be the perfect age to have the geek seed planted for the franchise that would bloom.But I never did go during the first run, put off by the lines that wrapped around theaters, and then convinced I knew all there was to know by the clips, televised Star Wars specials and parodies that had overtaken pop culture like nothing I had ever witnessed before.
And so, I did not see Star Wars until after a date with a young woman who wanted desperately to go to The Empire Strikes Back. What I perceived as part two—but what any card-carrying nerd will correct as part five—left such an impression that I watched the subtitled “A New Hope” the first chance I could on cable.
I’ve harbored a similar attitude toward The Endless Summer, Dana Point filmmaker Bruce Brown’s 1966 surfing documentary that has so strongly pervaded pop culture that I believed I had seen all there was to see without having seen it.