“Have you been reading those Hustlers I gave you?”
“A lot of the pages are stuck together.”
“Yeah, they do that. Humidity.”
“A lot of the pages are stuck together.”
“Yeah, they do that. Humidity.”
The Story:
Giving into pressure from his mom, lacrosse star Jordan (Corey Sevier) relocates midway through his senior year of high school from Maryland to Laguna Beach to gain more experience in the sport. Falling from the popular lacrosse guy to unpopular lacrosse guy in the eyes of the bevy of Californa surfer types at his new school, Jordan finds solace with the weirdos; the virgin, the goth chick and the punker. When the topic of a senior trip to Costa Rica taking place during the High School Surfing Championships arises, Jordan convinces the exhiled from attending group of misfits to ball up and head to the tropics to not only raise some hell, but to learn from former surf champion, Rip (Harland Williams), the ways of the wave and beat these jerkoffs at their own game to become the best surfers in the country in just two short weeks!
The Review:
The Review:
If this is sounding familiar to you, it should as Surf School borrows from just about every teen comedy in history. With an IMDB user rating of a desolate 2.0, I was terrified before my little trip to Surf School; I've put myself through my share of horrid films (they all can't be The Shawshank Redemption, right?), but even I have never went into a film so universally panned and made it out in one piece. From the first moments of the film, I soon realized that foul play must certainly be the cause of this odd bombardment of utter hatred. My guess is it spent some time on the Bottom 100 list and nerds who like to be told what to do got on their keyboards and followed like sheep. Don't get me wrong, Surf School isn't good, but hell, for such a low score I never expected it to be in focus. If this gets a 2.0, what must these people think of Pigs?
As expected, the plot plays out as ludicrously impossible as it seems, a trademark of these such underdog films, and the characters are derivitive and stereotypical. Where glimmers of hope are seen is in the fact that none of the characters are despiseable and are generally well-meaning. The bad guys consist of a group of three dickheads that pale in comparison to the antagonists common in the 80s and include a drug addled surfer who might take the crown as having the most deeply fried brain in titty comedy history. Jordan and co. join an old hippie couple that run a quaint little hotel and meet the incredibly ripped Rip, who reveals he's been living one long blackout for the last three decades. They don't do much surfing, but they somehow gain the skills to go toe to toe with the best in the country in the a surfing competition so cheesy and low budget it made the skiing championship in Hot Dog look legitimate.
Where the film really gains points with this cat is the fact that Swedish females are well represented, even in Costa Rica. Whereas normal flicks feature one angel haired beauty, Surf School goes the extra mile in providing three naked Scandinavian seductresses that are about as tantalizing as any ladies on the face of God's green earth. I knew I did that report on Sweden in grade 3 for a reason! Add in a virgin-starved Costa Rican babe, excellent visual use of tropical locales (the direction is bland, though) and a fuckin' monkey and you've got yourself plenty entertaining supporting characters that could only exist in films such as this. Avoiding mean-spirited jokes gives it slight credibility as well; the ending is so happy you could almost puke. Furthermore, I've never witnessed a monkey spank a blindfolded geek to climax before. Thanks to Surf School, it's another scratch off the bucket list. (Brett H.)
Tale of the Tape:
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