Surfing is an ancient sport — but I’m glad we’ve got contemporary equipment to document it.
MALIA, which documents Hawaiian surf badass Malia Manuel’s connection to the sport, forced that perspective on me right away.
The first few minutes are primal and deep, and they scared me as much as they entranced me. I actually gasped — yes, I really did — at some shots, and how cameras depicted Manuel interacting with her home coastline.
Photo: Screenshot
There’s the mesmeric, thrumming beat. (Sound very much “on” for this one.) Dark purples and roiling seas under heavy storms. Then Manuel, barreling perfect curler after perfect curler.
Each time a surf scene interjected, it bucked me a little. I’d gotten so homed in on an odd, connective sensation that measurable human activity seemed like an overlay — a blip.
Photo: screenshot
Then I’d get totally reeled in by Manuel, motionless on the board, as captured by steady-handed camera work.
Photo: Screenshot
“I carry within me four generations of love and connection to this island,” Manuel says in voiceover.
Ok, now that we’re done with the first three minutes, what about the other 12?
All I’m going to say is: see for yourself.
Photo: Screenshot
Researchers think some 400-year-old Hawaiian petroglyphs depict surfers. The engraved figures, which are up to five feet long, surface every several decades from receding sand on Oahu’s Waianae Coast. When they do, it becomes clear how close they are to well-known breaks.
If there’s a 2023 video equivalent to a surf petroglyph from half a millennium ago, this is it.
