Blue Crush Review
by Eugene Novikov (eugenen AT wharton DOT upenn DOT edu)August 19th, 2002
Blue Crush (2002)
Reviewed by Eugene Novikov
http://www.ultimate-movie.com/
Starring Kate Bosworth, Michelle Rodriguez, Matthew Davis, Mika Boorem, Sanoe Lake, Chris Taloa.
Directed by John Stockwell.
Rated PG-13.
"Out there, you don't just get crushed... you die."
Blue Crush is based on a novel called "Surf Girls of Maui," a title changed because of its cheesiness but also, one hopes, because it is misleading: the movie, from up-and-coming director John Stockwell (crazy/beautiful) isn't what you would expect from something called "Surf Girls of Maui." While the surfer chicks in bikinis are more than plentiful, Blue Crush achieves something no other surfing movie has even attempted: it tells a good story, with a lovely screenplay and engaging characters. And though Stockwell is eventually forced to cheat on his plotting, I was willing to forgive all when I realized that this must have been one of the most difficult productions ever undertaken.
The story briefly reminded me of Disney's Lilo & Stitch: a young woman in Hawaii has to keep her younger sister out of trouble while making ends meet and pursuing an avocation of her own. This time, however, no malevolent little alien shows up to literally chew the scenery. Anne Marie (Kate Bosworth) is a renowned surfer who was sidelined three years ago by a near-drowning incident in which her head was slammed against the edge of a reef. Now, she is looking to make a comeback at the same competition that brought her down, looking to dominate the toughest surf pipes in the world.
Her training time unfortunately coincides with the arrival of an NFL football team on vacation at the posh local hotel where Anne Marie and her friends hold down jobs as housekeepers. Anne Marie gets herself fired after flipping out at one of the linebackers about a used condom left in the room, but winds up falling for the quarterback (Matthew Davis), who pays her absurd amounts of money for surfing lesson. Her friend Eden (Michelle Rodriguez), who has spent the last three years dragging Anne Marie back onto the surfboard is none too happy about her spending her days hanging out in a football player's hotel room instead of honing her game for the competition that rapidly approaches.
I shudder to think of the horrors that the filming of Blue Crush is sure to have entailed. Stockwell's camera is almost impossibly dynamic, zooming over, under and around the actors; in the water, under surfboards and out again all in the same shot, taking us into the heart of the world's most dangerous waves and bringing us out alive. At first, the cinematography is disorienting -- mainly because I didn't expect the camera to constantly remain so close to the water, surely a more difficult technique than shooting from a higher angle -- but it became visceral and exciting once I got used to it. Stockwell gives us a feel for the sport, and for the intimidating size and strength of these waves, which would surely induce a heart attack were I to be placed on one and expected to surf it.
The movie creates instinctively sympathetic characters, a feeling that these are good people, not just pointlessly noble and admirable ones. When Anne Marie loses her temper and snaps at Eden, we flinch because the movie has taken such care in establishing their relationship. Even the love story is more than the obligatory stand-by it should have been: the quarterback is interesting because he is genuinely sweet, well-intentioned, very deep-pocketed... and flying out in less than a week, possibly never to return. When Anne Marie asks whether she will be just a story he tells when someone asks where he learned how to surf, his response isn't the expected vehement denial, but a good question: "What do you want?"
I mentioned that Blue Crush doesn't play fair. Indeed, Anne Marie makes certain choices early in the film that should have had corresponding consequences, but the movie, in a desperate effort to have its cake and eat it, too, lets her get by. The ending is a disappointing retreat into a moral black hole, as the movie embraces tired sports-movie conventions after spending the first two acts trying to avoid them.
As the poster suggests, there are plenty of gorgeous "surf babes" to be found here, especially in Michelle Rodriguez, who has made a career out of playing tough-but-beautiful women. There's a little more than that, too: Blue Crush comes very close to being an honest-to-goodness "good movie."
Grade: B-
Up Next: Simone
©2002 Eugene Novikov
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
