A cocky group of top surfers from both Australia and South Africa go to the North Shore in Hawaii in the mid-1970's in order to make their mark by transforming surfing that at the time was widely perceived as a leisurely activity into something that could be taken seriously as a legitimate professional vocation. Wayne 'Rabbit' Bartholomew, Ian Cairns, Mark Richards, Shaun Tomson, and Peter Townend are amongst the bold pioneers interviewed herein who took Hawaii by storm with their exceptional surfing skills, a brash and fiercely competitive go-for-the-throat attitude, and swaggering bravado that spit in the face of staid tradition and royally upset the locals, yet in the long run proved to be hugely influential figures in the world of surfing. Director Jeremy Gosch relates with tremendous passion and gusto a remarkably inspirational story about a close-knit bunch of lovably scrappy and arrogant blokes with an incredible dream and the gutsy determination to do whatever it takes to make said dream a glorious reality. Moreover, we get some fascinating background information not only on Hawaiian tradition and basic surfing history, but also on the surfers themselves, with Bartholomew in particular registering strongly as one hell of an admirable man who at one startling point cries on camera while candidly talking about growing up in abject poverty. It's this sense of intimacy which in turn gives this film a depth and poignancy that makes it so much more than just another sports documentary about surfing. Further graced by a right-on groovy soundtrack, fine narration by Edward Norton, and plenty of spectacular surfing footage (watching Tomson ride inside the tube is truly something to behold), this one rates highly as a sterling documentary on a crucial moment in surf history as well as an uplifting testament to the awesome power of the indomitable human spirit.
3 Reviews
Excellent surfing documentary about several guys who revolutionized the sport
Woodyanders29 June 2015
Warning: Spoilers
Passable documentary of Surfing culture in Hawaii in the 1970's
colin_coyne1 September 2009
"Bustin' Down the Door", tells the tale of the rise, fall and rise again of the surfing culture on the North Beach area of Hawaii in the 1970's
and documenting the rise of the professional surfing industry
I felt that even though the story was interesting and some of the archive action shots of the surfers and the waves were very good
although much, too much of the time the camera was focused on the faces of individuals in the story just relating their particular version of the tale to the viewer from their viewpoint
that's why I thought that it would have been far better made as more of a documentary (perhaps for TV) than a big-screen film.
I was also a little disappointed in the music that went with the surf scenes I thought that this could have been done an awful lot better maybe, perhaps I may have been too harshly comparing it to the superb Pink Floyd music from the Echoes album that went alongside another "surfer" type film in 1975 called "Crystal Voyager".
I was also a bit annoyed at the "constant" repetition of certain surfing clips over, and over again it seemed to "cheapen" the overall impact of film by using the same footage many times ...
Otherwise the film (as a documentary) pretty much seemed to capture the mood of the moment in Hawaii in the 1970's and the trials, tribulations, failures and successes of the leading players in the surfing world at the time ...
Narrated well by Edward Norton, some of the main characters being interviewed are quite enigmatic, namely Wayne "Rabbit" Bartholomew, Mark Richards (MR), and Shaun Tomson but, I feel that you'd probably would need a keen interest in surfing to get fully into this movie otherwise it's no more than a "passable" documentary
Also, although I saw this at the BFI IMAX cinema, it was shot in 2D (not 3D), and filled 1/2 to a 1/3 of the screen – not the full IMAX screen
I was also a little disappointed in the music that went with the surf scenes I thought that this could have been done an awful lot better maybe, perhaps I may have been too harshly comparing it to the superb Pink Floyd music from the Echoes album that went alongside another "surfer" type film in 1975 called "Crystal Voyager".
I was also a bit annoyed at the "constant" repetition of certain surfing clips over, and over again it seemed to "cheapen" the overall impact of film by using the same footage many times ...
Otherwise the film (as a documentary) pretty much seemed to capture the mood of the moment in Hawaii in the 1970's and the trials, tribulations, failures and successes of the leading players in the surfing world at the time ...
Narrated well by Edward Norton, some of the main characters being interviewed are quite enigmatic, namely Wayne "Rabbit" Bartholomew, Mark Richards (MR), and Shaun Tomson but, I feel that you'd probably would need a keen interest in surfing to get fully into this movie otherwise it's no more than a "passable" documentary
Also, although I saw this at the BFI IMAX cinema, it was shot in 2D (not 3D), and filled 1/2 to a 1/3 of the screen – not the full IMAX screen
Mainly for fans of the sport
Wizard-83 October 2015
I have never been on a surfboard in my life, but thanks to surf documentaries like "Endless Summer", I do think the sport of surfing is pretty cool and something I would like to try before I kick the bucket. So I was interested in watching "Bustin' Down the Door" when I found a copy, especially since it promised to discuss something about the sport I didn't know about before - how surfing became a multi-million dollar industry. While I did find the end results sometimes interesting, I don't think the documentary is as strong as it could be. There is some cool surfing footage, but when it comes to the human angle the movie is really lacking. It's mostly a collection of talking heads, and more often what is said by the participants doesn't add much insight or advance things terribly much. It tells the story in a real slow fashion, and once it gets to interesting topics like the resentment of Hawaiian surfers to the outsiders coming in and shaking things up, it doesn't go into great detail and instead speeds towards the end. Another problem is that the movie often seems to be preaching to the choir, assuming its audience knows a lot about the featured surfers and what they experienced. The documentary is not without interest, but I think the only audience that could really appreciate it would be surfing aficionados.
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