Stream It Or Skip It?

Add The Surfer (now streaming on VOD platforms like Amazon Prime Video) to Nicolas Cage’s growing list of recent odd-duck indie-movie performances, a la Pig, Dream Scenario, and Longlegs. The guy couldn’t be dull if he tried, even when he’s kinda doing exactly what we expect – in this case, playing a weirdo (not a stretch) who loses his shit (also not a stretch). Specifically, a weirdo who just wants to surf one specific beach that happens to be fiercely guarded by a gang of territorial bullies. Director Lorcan Finnegan brings his own eccentricity to the proceedings (see also: Vivarium, Nocebo), pushing the film into a state of bizarre reverie that fits his leading man like a body glove.

THE SURFER: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: We only know him as The Surfer (Cage). No other name. His son? The Kid (Finn Little). Yes, this is one of those movies that plays out all allegorical-like, sort of. I don’t think anyone will protest if I nickname him Surfie. It’s just fun. Surfie desperately wants to surf those specific waves at this specific Australian beach with his son. That way, they’ll get a good view of the oceanside home Surfie’s trying to buy, the same home where he grew up, until his father died and his mother moved him to California (yes, breathe a sigh of relief — Cage doesn’t attempt an Aussie accent). Key word, trying – there’s something to do with another bid and needing to scrounge another $100k to beat it, and while Surfie seems reasonably well-off, what with his fancy sunglasses and Lexus, buying such expensive real estate is stretching him thin. And the pressure cooker gets turned up a notch when his ex-wife calls to chide him for letting The Kid skip school. And tell him she’s getting married. And pregnant. And that he needs to get off his ass and sign the divorce papers. Daggers. In his heart.

But as I’ve heard, surfing is a lovely and transcendent activity to get your mind off your daily troubles. Not that Surfie gets to do that today. As soon as he and his son suit up and get their boards under their arms, they’re “greeted” by sunbaked ruffians led by a smirking alpha named Scally (Julian McMahon). They’re the Bay Boys. They’re bullies and assholes, exclusively. You try to surf their waves, you get roughed up. “Don’t live here, don’t surf here,” they shout in Surfie’s face. But Surfie protests: He grew up here! And he’s buying that house over there! Too bad. Here’s a fist in the solar plexus for your trouble. And we’ll keep your surfboard, thank you.

The Kid is smart enough to call it. He heads home. But Surfie is stubborn. He stays. Hangs out in the parking lot, trying to… what’s he trying to do? Avoid reality? Will the Bay Boys to change their mind? I’m not sure. He fields calls from the finance guy who’s helping him rustle up that $100k. He talks to The Bum (Nic Cassim), who lives out of his dingy car. He gets a sympathetic ear from a woman (Miranda Tapsell) who shows up to shoot some photos. He meets one of the Bay Boys’ wives, who shrugs off their behavior. He calls a cop, who’s sympathetic to the Bay Boys. He stays overnight, using binoculars to watch the Bay Boys party hard at a bonfire. He loses his shoes. He loses his sunglasses. He loses his car. He loses his phone. He has no food. He has no water. He has too much sun. He contemplates eating a dead rat. He loses his mind. And we can’t tell what’s real or a hallucination anymore. 

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: The Surfer is Point Break crossed with Red Rock West, which is another Cage vehicle in which he can’t seem to escape one specific locale.

Performance Worth Watching: What? You think I’m going to say “Julian McMahon” here? This is a Nicolas Cage Being Weird movie. We might not be watching it otherwise.

Memorable Dialogue: One of the Bay Boys’ wives: “Men are like engines – you gotta release a little steam now and then or you’ll blow up. … If it stops ’em from beating the botox outta their wives, so be it!”

Sex and Skin: None.

Our Take: “I’m getting it all back!”, Surfie exclaims, trying to will it to be true when it’s becoming less true by the second. It’s like trying to keep the sand in the sieve. The deeper his denial, the loopier The Surfer gets, with its warped imagery, slippery sense of time and other surreal flourishes. Finnegan clings to Surfie’s perspective as he suffers one damn thing after another, much of his unraveling self-initiated as he refuses to accept that his life can never be what it once was. Losing yourself out on a wave is a lot different than losing yourself in the baking-hot sun, in an ugly little parking lot. 

Finnegan, working with a screenplay by Thomas Martin, pitches plenty of red herrings at us. But he subscribes to the David Lynch School of Inexplicability, and never hands us a net to snag them. The film runs on a quiet strain of intuitive weirdness; we question reality (the sun rises and sets, but do we necessarily trust that?) and theorize that some characters are more than just bit players in Surfie’s conundrum, that they’re representations of bigger things. Or maybe the film is just being weird for its own sake? The film portrays the Bay Boys with more certainty – they’re a cult with core men’s-rights philosophies, baptismal rituals and a mantra, “Before you can surf, you must suffer.” Meanwhile, Cage cracks us up by repeating his own whiny quasi-mantra, that the Bay Boys are engaging in egregious “localism.” It’s a question of civility, see.

I can see some casual viewers being turned off by their inability to fit The Surfer’s oddball dalliances into a tidy narrative framework, but its umbrella ideas eventually clarify, as the screenplay makes assertions about identity, belonging and the need for personal change. Beyond that, it’s never not enjoyable to watch Cage dig deep and lose his shit, especially when he’s backed by a director who’s on the same nutty wavelength. 

Our Call: And you have to be on that wavelength to enjoy The Surfer. As ever, Cage makes it worth a shot: STREAM IT.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.