“The Surfer Kid”

“Hotshots” looks at a movie!

Chasing Mavericks is not a story about ranch cowboys chasing after motherless calves, but is instead based on a true story about one particular teenage boy who wanted to learn how to surf some of the most dangerous waves in the world.

Those waves are located near Santa Cruz, California, they are created whenever an El Nino weather system occurs, and they are called “the mavericks.”

The story begins in 1987, and we see 8-year-old Jay and his slightly older friend Kim playing near a beach with heavy surf. Jay jumps into the water to save Kim’s dog, but then Jay gets caught by the waves and could easily drown.

Suddenly a man who had been surfing appears, and he pulls Jay out of the water.

The man is Frosty Hesson, played by Gerard Butler, and surfing is his passion, his life, and his escape.

Jay learns how to surf, and then we jump seven years later when he is now played by Jonny Weston. Coincidentally, Frosty lives right across the street with his wife and two kids from where Jay lives with his alcoholic mother, played by Elisabeth Shue.

One night Jay hitches a ride on Frosty’s van when Jay sees him leave to go surfing, and he watches Frosty and three men surf the most powerful waves you can imagine, which are talked about in the area, but no one knew for sure that they existed.

As Frosty tells Jay, “That wave is a myth, and the four of us want to keep it that way.”

Well, you can imagine the rest of the story.  Jay asks Frosty to teach him how to surf the mavericks, Frosty reluctantly agrees, and then we watch a regimen of training right out of the 1984 The Karate Kid, but fortunately without the “Wax on, wax off” scenes, only there are some shots of Jay waxing his surfboard.

Although the movie is about surfing and includes many scenes of surfing, there are additional subplots involving Jay’s personal and home life, Frosty’s relationship with his wife and family, and Jay’s relationship with Kim.

In other words, it is a traditional movie about a nontraditional subject, and the “big game” at the end this time is surfing the “big wave.”

Chasing Mavericks could even more likely have been called The Surfer Kid.

I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”