The Top Ten Best Adventure Surf Movies Ever

Ok we're a bit mental for surf films here, in fact I watch at least two or three a day, I know sad right. So we decided we'd put it out to our group of testers and come up with some kind of list of the best ten adventure movies. Now we have some very notable mentions, which arguably could be right at the top, but Endless Summer, which was an adventure when it was filmed is right up there, Inner Most Limits of Pure Fun, Morning of The Earth, Crystal Voyager and numerous other early movies could all be classed as adventure surf films, but we decided to put those to one side and come up with ones which we would consider our top Ten now so in reverse order - 

10. Under An Arctic Sky - By Chris Burkard Studio - Everyone agreed they loved this film, it is visually incredible but as an out and out adventure surf wise it wasn't breaking enough new ground for us, except of course the incredible northern lights surfing sequence. It's an amazing film as you would expect from Chris' Studio never the less though. 

9. Stormriding Pakistan - Incredibly this was edited in the TSP studios, by Dan Haycock the then designer and myself. It is raw adventure, it was cobbled together from everyones footage they shot, so it is a bit disjointed, but it is an adventure which because of the political situation could never be repeated. Unfortunately can't be played here but check it out on YouTube - https://youtu.be/vrbhXzMjUiI

8. Journey To The Centre Of The Surf by Ian Battrick is a raw adventure,  we all agreed that you simply do not get anything more legit than this. The guy is living in a tiny van, in the worst winter, surfing very serious waves. As anyone who knows Ian knows he will paddle out in anything. It would be higher if it had some more land footage of surfing, but you know what, as soon as you ad a videographer into the mix it becomes less legit. 

7.  Russia - Outpost Volume 1 - follows Keith Malloy, Dane Gudauskas, Cyrus Sutton, Trevor Gordon, Foster Huntington plus film makers Chris Burkard, and Ben Weiland into the wilds of Kamtchtka, not the first expedition here, but certainly the most extensive, and whilst it was one of Ben and Chris' earlier films, and it is a bit rough round the edges, it is an epic adventure. 

6. Under A Desert Sun - Kepa Acero - he has made so many worthy films, in Chilli, West Africa and Patagonia, oh and Antartica, and this is a bit of a combined ranking for them all, but our favourite is his adventure in Angola  which you can fin here - https://youtu.be/HOZxBHaetXw

5. Bear Island - Three Norwegian brothers, dropped off on one of the most remote islands on Earth, well within the arctic circle. They fish, surf, snowboard, jump off cliffs, there is nothing not to like here it is an epic adventure 

Bjørnøya / Bear Island from Weggefilms on Vimeo.

 

4. Gauchos Del Mar - this group of guys from Argentina have made some incredible films around the southern tip of South America, a bit like Kepa Acero hard to pin down one so you should check their site - http://gauchosdelmar.com - but we agreed on one stand out Peninsula Mitre, an incredible watch - 

3.  Second Thoughts, the oldest film here and a classic. Timmy Turner and friends living on and off on an island in Indonesia, gettign absolutely shacked out of their mind on one of the most dangerous waves on the planet. It inspired so many people to explore, and whilst the wave is no longer a secret or difficult to get to, it was a full on adventure at the time. If Timmy had of released Cold Thoughts the follow up, it wold have been on the list as well. 

2. Cradle Of Storms - Chris Burkard and Ben Weiland. Ben and Chris make good adventure movies, there is no doubt and in my mind, this is one of the best ever. It is definitely the best for adventure combined with epic waves, hands down, and it was a very close call between this and the number one. But it is frontier exploration with incredible waves and a must watch.

 

1. North Of The Sun -  This wasn't as contentious as I thought it would be, I had this as my number one right from the start, and of the twenty of us, 19 thought it was the ultimate adventure film. It is an epic, a whole winter on an Arctic beach in a shelter you have made yourself, truly amazing. It encapsulates everything there is about adventure and yes the surfing isn't epic, but if you want incredible surfing, you don't always get the full adventure. 

 There are loads more, and we looked at films like Seawolf, Cold Water Journal, Outpost The Faros, The Need Essential Movies, A Corner Of The Earth and several others but they dont quite fit the out and out adventure. Plus it's all subjective, just go watch them all and make up your own mind!!