May it Never End :: A 50th Anniversary 30 Vid-Cap Look (And Then Some) at Bruce Brown's The Endless Summer (1966)

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“Many surfers ride summer and winter but the ultimate thing for most of us would be to have an endless summer; the warm water and waves without the summer crowds of California. The only way to do this is to travel around the world, following the summer season as it moves around the world…” 

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Bruce Brown got his first surfboard in 1952. Well, it was more of a raft that the novice surfer cut and re-shaped into a 75-pound plank that more or less resembled a surfboard when he finished the last layer of fiber-glass coating. Of course, it was with a camera where Brown would make his true impact on surf-culture, first with still-photography, which he used to try and capture “the draw” of the sport, something almost spiritual on an elemental level.

Again, Brown hadn’t quite found his true medium yet but that soon changed during a hitch in the navy; for, while stationed in Oahu, Hawaii, Brown started shooting 8mm footage of his friends and fellow surfers doing their thing in many hot-spots around the islands. Then, after his discharge and a return home to California, Brown spliced all that film together into a rough, hour-long feature that he would barnstorm around Orange County, showing it in libraries and high school gyms, with him on stage controlling the volume on a tape recorder as he provided live narration of what was on screen while his wife, Pat, handled projector duties.

At some point the film caught the attention of Dale “Hawk” Velzy, a local surf legend and surfboard maker, who is also credited with opening the first ever commercial surfboard shop, and struck a deal to set-up a screening room in one of his outlets in San Clemente, charging admission, eventually raising enough money for an upgrade, allowing Brown to purchase a 16mm camera; and together, Velzy and Brown managed to raise nearly $5,000 for a “real” documentary feature on surfing, Slippery When Wet (1958), followed by Surf Crazy (1959), Barefoot Adventure (1960), and Surfing Hollow Days (1961); basically one film a year, shot during the summer and fall, then edited together over the winter, and then released ad hoc in the spring.

And each film used the exact same formula; spectacular footage shot by Brown (-- from the beach or on a board himself), with his dry and wry observations, and his drool and often misfiring sense of humor, usually coming straight off the cob, serving as the (very) informal narrative to tie it altogether. Mix all that with a mellow interstitial soundtrack and you essentially wound up with a Thorazine-drip of a mellowing, mesmerizing moving-picture that just draws you right out of your seat and into the water to paddle out with the subject matter.

"I never had formal training in filmmaking and that probably worked to my advantage,” said Brown. And it’s true. Everything he does shouldn’t work, and yet it totally does. As I said, each film thus far had taken a year to complete, but now, Brown was thinking about tackling something bigger, perhaps something that could be shown on a national scale, saying, "I felt if I could take two years to make a film, maybe I could make something really special." To fit that bill, he had a notion about a film which would feature a couple of surfers exploring areas that had never been surfed before on a solitary quest to find the perfect wave in the wilds of Africa. But then further inspiration hit when a travel agent informed Brown it was almost just as cheap to circumnavigate the whole globe as it was for a round-trip ticket to Capetown, South Africa, which planted the seed of not only finding that perfect wave but following the summer season around the world and experience a true endless summer.

To raise money for this endeavor, Brown mortgaged out his house and spliced all the best parts of his previous efforts into a new film, Waterlogged (1962), and took it out on tour to drum up support. And once he had enough scratch (-- approximately $50,000), Brown took off with two of his surfer buddies, Mike Hynson and Robert August, and a minimal crew of two (Rodney Sumpter and Nat Young), finding and hitting all kinds of spots up and down the African coast (-- and finding that perfect wave along the way on the Cape of St. Francis), experiencing some massive culture shock, too, but more or less spreading good will as they went, then to Australia (-- which turned into a major bummer), then New Zealand, and Tahiti, and eventually ending up in Hawaii.

The surf-footage Brown captured along the way is truly amazing, spliced into some ersatz travelogue footage and some massive inserts from earlier shoots. (The scenes of the mammoth surf at Waimea Bay and the Herculean efforts to conquer it could stand as its own mini-feature.) And as he edited it all together the filmmaker struck gold by striking a deal with The Sandals, who provided the mellowest theme of ever and several other tunes for the soundtrack, mixed in liberally with several library stock cues to great effect.

When the film was completed in 1964, Brown shopped The Endless Summer around to several studios but found nary a nibble. Seems they felt it had no mainstream appeal and would never play anywhere that wasn’t 10 feet from the ocean. Undaunted, Brown booked a two-week run in Wichita, Kansas, in the dead of winter, which quickly sold out as the frozen land-locked denizens soaked up all that fun in the eternal sun. But it wasn’t until after Brown took the film to New York City, where it played successfully for nearly a year, that the quarter finally dropped for several distributors, with Cinema V winning out because they were satisfied with releasing the film as is (-- the only change this distributor made was to blow up the 16mm print to 35mm before releasing it), while the others had demanded several changes, including junking John Van Hamersveld’s iconic poster art, lighting a fire that turned a local craze into a national phenomenon, earning the film nearly $5-million domestically and over $20-million internationally.

With the nigh inexplicable success of his little documentary that could, with his laconic, laid-back narration, where he makes the right decision to be an enthusiastic presenter and not a zealous preacher of the culture he loves, and a simplistic and minimalist style that is best described as just ‘point and shoot’, Brown was soon dubbed the “Bergman of the boards,” by TIME magazine and anointed the “Fellini of the foam” by The New York Times. Famed film critic Roger Ebert was equally flummoxed by the mass appeal of the film, himself afflicted, pondering and observing over how “Brown used only what he could carry, shunning the tons of equipment ordinarily taken along on location. The beautiful photography he brought home almost makes you wonder if Hollywood hasn't been trying too hard."

Personally, I am a huge fan of this film and The Endless Summer has held a spot in my top ten going on three decades now since I first saw it on one of the Superstations many moon-doogies ago. And I know this film is personally responsible for the galloping delusion that I harbor the soul of a surfer, currently trapped in a large gelatinous mass that couldn’t be any further from either ocean if he tried. (And it's also why this song will most probably be played at my funeral.) Ah, well, I would make a better buoyant surfboard than a surfer but live to live vicariously and all of that.

2016 marks the 50th Anniversary of The Endless Summer’s national release in 1966 and it still holds its power to put the hypno-whammy on an audience to this very day. And I think it’s that very same simplicity and amateur gung-ho approach that has allowed it to age so gracefully when most other relics of the 1960s surf-boom come off as pure camp. No, this errant quest of two “hotdogging Galahads out searching for the perfect wave” is a lot deeper than that. How deep? Well, that’s up to each individual viewer. And if you haven’t had the pleasure of watching it yet, I encourage you to come on in, the water’s fine and the conditions don’t get much more perfect than this film right here. 

Other Points of Interest:

Poster campaign for The Endless Summer at the Archive.

The Endless Summer (1966) Bruce Brown Films :: Monterey Media / P: Robert Bagley, Bruce Brown / D: Bruce Brown / W: Bruce Brown / C: Bruce Brown / E: Bruce Brown / M: The Sandals / S: Robert August, Michael Hynson, Terence Bullen, Bruce Brown

Vintage Tuneage :: Floats Like a Buttefly and Stings Like a Bee :: Remembering the Greatest of All Time!

Video courtesy of Liverbird04.

He was the greatest of all time, most definitely. I remember having this 45-single when I was a kid and listening to it endlessly, trying to mimic his cadence and swagger, always holding on to a hope that Ali would give Howard Cosell a deserving poke in the nose. And if you haven't had the pleasure yet, here's a link that will allow you to check out that time the Champ fought Superman. 

The Worms Are Waiting, the Red Queen Decrees :: A Beer-Gut Reaction to Arrow Video's Emilio Miraglia Double-Feature of The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave (1971) and The Red Queen Kills Seven Times (1972)

Emilio Miraglia worked his way up from script supervisor to assistant director through the course of about two-dozen genre films, shifting between crime dramas [The Terrorist (1963), Wake Up and Die (1966)] and sword and chuckable-styrofoam-boulder epics [Goliath and the Dragon (1960), Hercules Against the Sons of the Sun (1964)], before settling into the director’s chair for his most famous two-punch combo of The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave (1971) and The Red Queen Kills Seven Times (1972). Serving as writer and director for both films, Miraglia’s end result are a bizarre mash-up of a gialli and Gothic melodrama with serpentine plots that are nigh impossible to unravel as they try to devour their own tails, which are then almost completely undone by one (or two or six) plot twist(s) too many.

To be fair, The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave only has one twist but it’s a real slobberknocker that is saved for the climax where things get a bit … messy. Before we spill that milk, we begin with a wealthy English aristocrat named Alan (Steffen), who has recently been released from an asylum after a lengthy stay for suffering a nervous breakdown when he caught his wife, Evelyn, having sex with another man. Seems Evelyn has now passed on, and Alan’s doctor (Stuart) feels his patient is ready to be integrated back into society. But the high-strung Alan is still obsessed with his wife, holding seances to try and contact her spirit (-- that appear to be working), and bringing hookers and strippers, all ringers and surrogates for his late, red-haired wife, back to his palatial estate for his own private therapy sessions, where he gives the nickel tour that always end up in the old ancestral dungeon where the host kinda Hydes-out, whipping his victims before restraining and killing them -- or does he?

See, we always cut away before Alan puts the final exclamation point on these interludes, with him waking up later, alone, somewhere on the grounds, suffering from a seeming lycanthropic hangover with no real memory of what he’s done and no evidence of his deeds to be found. Despite all of this odd behavior -- some might even call it psychotic, his doctor insists Alan is fine; and with the encouragement of his cousin Farley (Raho), Alan decides to get married again, taking Gladys (Malfatti), another *ahem* ‘exotic dancer’, as his wife. And while this seems to calm Alan down considerably, sinister forces seem to be conspiring against Gladys. And once the hired help is ruled out, husband and wife begin to suspect the rumors of Evelyn’s death might’ve been greatly exaggerated. And then these suspicions take us by the hand and lures everybody into a final ambush of double-crosses, gaslight revelations, and an inheritance grab with a climax where things really get twisted into an intractable knot of “You have gotta be kidding me”. Wow.

Watching these kind of euro-sleaze thrillers is like playing a game of chess with the directors who are behind them. After several lengthy moves -- some strategic, others brazen, while others daftly stupid -- and after you’ve spent all that time keeping track of the pawns (-- the victims), rooks (-- the red herrings), bishops (-- the bumbling police force) and knights (-- the protagonist), shifting around the checkered field, trying to make heads or tails out of what your opponent is trying to show you, in the end, when we reach the end of the movie, the director tends to put his finger on his own king and leverages the board into tipping over, scattering the other remaining pieces, then rights it, takes his finger off the still standing king and declares himself the winner. It’s a twist, sure, but it’s also a big old cheat and completely unfair to those playing along and trying to pay attention. And thanks to the ambiguity of that final big twist, the implications of who gets away with what at the end of The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave are a bit scurvy and, dare I say, a bit of a buzzkill. It doesn't help that Miraglia has an eye for a certain type of woman, which resulted in all of his actresses looking nearly identical, making it hard to deduce who we're looking at half the time.

Luckily, The Red Queen Kills Seven Times is a lot more coherent. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it made sense by any means -- well, sort of, and once again his actresses are all ringers for each other, but at least the five-car twist pile-up at the end isn’t a cheat as we find out who was behind the killer’s mask all along. Here, Miraglia really finds a proper balance between Bava’s old school chills and Argento’s sensuous violence. We begin in the past where two feuding sisters, Kitty and Evelyn, get a time-out from dismembering each others dolls long enough for Grandpa Wildenbrück (Schündler) to explain a macabre painting that relates to a centuries old family curse involving two sisters known as the Red and Black Queen. Seems the Red Queen was killed (-- more like put down) but, according to the legend, she rose from the dead and killed seven people in the Wildenbrück circle. AND! This curse appears to hereditary as it cycles around every 100 years, with two more sisters coming under the homicidal influence, with seven more people killed to mark the deadly anniversary. AND! This curse is due to strike again in ten years time in 1972.

We warp ahead, then, only to find out Kitty (Bouchet) kinda jumped the gun on the curse, having accidentally killed Evelyn (Guido) during one hellacious cat-fight. And with the help of her older sister, Francesca (Malfatti again), and her husband, Herbert (Korda), they cover up the crime, hiding the body in a secret chamber deep in the bowels of the family castle and convincing everyone else that the sister moved to America. But this help comes at a price as Kitty must forfeit any claim to the family fortune once their grandfather finally kicks the bucket. And this he does, helped along the way by a mysterious woman in a red cloak, who looks a lot like Evelyn, and who, essentially, frightens him to death. But at the reading of the will, there’s a snag as the old man’s final instructions prevent any disbursement until 1973 when the curse has officially passed. Meanwhile, the same lady in red starts slashing her way through Kitty’s colleagues and business associates at a modeling agency. And while all evidence, motive, and eye-witnesses accounts point to Evelyn being the Red Queen, we all know that’s impossible, right? -- Right?

Sure, there are other suspects, including Kitty’s boyfriend (Pagliai), his estranged wife currently secluded in an insane asylum, and a bevy of models (-- including a young Sybil Danning); but these red-herrings have a tendency to get bumped-off just as each come under suspicion. And as we barrel toward the climax, there’s some last second revelations on some precautions Grandpa Wildenbrück took to derail the curse before it struck again, meaning someone wasn’t who we thought, and points the finger at the real culprit, who in turn was being manipulated by someone else looking not just for a bigger piece of the inheritance but the whole pie. This, in turn, leads to one helluva climax that involves Kitty being lured and locked in the castle basement that is currently being flooded as part of the killer’s wild endgame. Now, some clumsy editing nearly short-circuits everything but this is overcome by the ambitious nature of the scene, that presciently plays out like the climax of The Drowning Pool (1975), as the door is forced open, saving Kitty but wiping out nearly all of her rescuers in the resulting deluge.

When I received Arrow Film’s Killer Dames boxset I was under the impression that I had not seen either Miraglia film before. Turns out that’s only half true as The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave rang a few bells and I finally traced it to a severely truncated and even more nonsensical version seen on the tube, back when our NBC affiliate used to rotate it and The Whip and The Body (1963) -- under its alternate title of What!, every other Sunday night after the news in the late 1970s. And while there were a couple of nifty and effective set-pieces (-- especially when 'Evelyn' actually came out of the grave), of the two films I found The Red Queen ran circles around it co-feature, thanks in most part to a more likeable cast, the addition of Alberto Spagnoli as cinematographer, who really energizes Miraglia’s set-ups and maximizes the German locations, and a hideously infectious score courtesy of Bruno Nicolai. As always, Arrow Film throws in an incredible package of extras, including commentaries and interviews with several actors and the films' production designer, and a couple of featurettes where an expert is brought in to help the audience decipher what they just watched, making the whole package well worth your time. 

Buy The Killer Dames Boxset at Arrow Films. 

Buy The Killer Dames Boxset at Amazon.

The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave (1971) Phoenix Cinematografica :: Phase One / P: Antonio Sarno / D: Emilio Miraglia / W: Fabio Pittorru, Massimo Felisatti / C: Gastone Di Giovanni / E: Romeo Ciatti / M: Bruno Nicolai / S: Anthony Steffen, Marina Malfatti, Enzo Tarascio, Giacomo Rossi Stuart, Umberto Raho

The Red Queen Kills Seven Times (1972) Phoenix Cinematografica :: Romano Film :: Traian Boeru :: Cannon Film Distributors / P: Elio Di Pietro / D: Emilio Miraglia / W: Fabio Pittorru, Emilio Miraglia / C: Alberto Spagnoli / E: Romeo Ciatti / M: Bruno Nicolai / S: Barbara Bouchet, Ugo Pagliai, Marina Malfatti, Nino Korda, Sybil Danning, Rudolf Schündler