Surf's Up

Surf's Up (2007) is an American computer-animated mockumentary film produced by Sony Pictures Animation, released on June 7, 2007 [1] by Columbia Pictures. It is a parody of surfing documentaries, such as The Endless Summer and Riding Giants.

Cody Maverick

Interviewer: Any other skills besides surfing?

Like what, like singing and dancing? [laughs] No, not me man, I just surf.

Singing and dancing refers to Happy Feet, another animated feature film with penguins.

I hope the cameras are rolling cause you're gonna want to watch this over and over and over again.

Cody being interviewed about his fathers death - Cody " I'm not the only kid on this island that their dads have been... eaten."

Interviewer "Still, it must have been traumatic." Cody "No not for me man, not for me."
"Cody's this, Cody's that" - Cody's me bro. Let me be me. When's that gonna start?

Mikey

[repeated line] I can't imagine a better day.
Whoa! Start the whale.
Can't this blubber ball go any faster? Step on it, fish stick!
Could somebody help the chicken?
They see their goal. They just go for it! They're not in it for the money or the glory. They're in it for the joy of it and the rapture and the slow-motion instant replay.
Ah, that didn't take too long. I feel lightheaded.
What’s with the "boom-chika-boom"?!

Lani

Somebody help the chicken!
Ah, crap!

Chicken Joe

Cody's around here somewhere, I can feel it in my nuggets!
Squidito on el stickito?
[repeated line] Radical.
That cloud looks like a kitten!

Geek/Big Z

Bring me some more clams!
No joy, man. No joy. Fail.

Tank "the Shedder" Evans

A role model? No. But I consider myself somebody that everyone should look up to. Kids should try to pretend that they're Tank. I mean, they should try. [chuckles] Good luck, kids!
Tank needs fuel
I… I… Mom I… I wasn’t polishing, I was talking to my friends!

Reggie Belafonte

Hey, Mikey, why don't you head on over to the snack bar and get yourself a big bowl of shut up!
I PROMOTE HAPPINESS!!! CAN YOU SEE THE HAPPINESS EMANATING FROM ME?!? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?!
[last lines] DON'T YOU WALK AWAY FROM ME!! I AM REGGIE BELAFON--[Mikey rips his hair off] OH! [to the filmmakers] TURN THAT THING OFF! MIKEY! YOU ARE SO FIRED!!!

Ivan (Fire Urchin)

Stepped on me? Stepped on me? Are you kiddin' me? This guy was dancing all over me. I mean, just look at this. Broken, broken, gone, gone, broken, broken, broken…!

Kate, Smudge, and Arnold

A winner is someone who doesn't knock me off my surf board, and break it when I'm trying to get some big waves. Specially Tank he is definitely not a winner.
He's a dirty trashcan full of poop.

Dialogue

Overvoice: Sea urchin in the foot, that sounds pretty nasty. How do you cure something like that?

Kate: You pee on it.

Overvoice: That's disgusting.

Kate: I knowww.

Cody: [he and Big Z are hanging upside down] Can we do some training? Like, seriously, please?

Big Z: What are you talking about? Whaddaya think we're doing?

Cody: We're acting like a couple of nut jobs, that's what I think we're doing.

Big Z: Yeah, good. You're learning.

Kate: [in a "vox pop" segment] My surfboard, uh, well, it's made out of palm wood... and while it's not very pretty... [the skeg of the surfboard falls off and Smudge tries to put it back on] ...it does the job quite well.

Cody: This is insane.

Lani: Stop fighting it, Cody! Just let go!

Lani: [Cody and Lani wash off under a waterfall] Can I ask you something personal?

Cody: Lani, we're in the shower together! Y'can say whatever you want.

Big Z: [teaching Cody to carve a board] All right, look. First of all, with the grain. With the grain. You see what I'm doing here? You let the tool do the work, you see? Just like you're riding the wave, you let the wave do the work. You don't fight the wave. You can't fight these big waves.

Cody: Why didn't you come back after you fell off the wave?

Big Z: [miserably] That wave... [sighs. Flashback is shown where young Z and Tank are competing] That last day, winning had become everything to me. I knew I was gonna beat Tank. But then uh, you know... he starts to surf circles around me. I saw what he was doing, I couldn't do what he was doing. Times had changed, you know, he... I didn't wanna walk back on that beach with all my fans there, you know, "Loser. I'm lookin' at Big Z, the loser, the has-been." So... [camera footage is shown where in a massive wave, Z had let go of his board and it smashed into the rocks] poof! Big Z's dead, and that's how it's gonna stay. Let me play that song. [begins playing his guitar]

Cody: [shocked] What about "Never give up?" What about "Find a way?"

Big Z: [sighs] Yeah, well...

Cody: You're giving up, Z! You're giving up!

Big Z: Yeah! I'm givin' up, that's my way. Givin' up.

Cody: I- I thought you were the one guy.

Big Z: [fed up] You don't like it, find your own way! [walks back to his shack] Leave me out of it! Leave me out of it.

Cast

Shia LaBeouf as Cody penguin Maverick
Jeff Bridges as Zeke "Big Z/Geek" Topanga
Zooey Deschanel as Lani Aliikai
Jon Heder as Chicken Joe
Mario Cantone as Mikey Abromowitz
James Woods as Reggie the otter Belafonte
Diedrich Bader as Tank "The Shredder" Evans
Dana Belben as Edna Maverick
Brian Posehn as Glen Maverick
Kelly Slater as himself
Rob Machado as himself
Ash Brannon as himself
Chris Buck as himself
Sal Masekela as himself
Reed Buck as Arnold
Reese Elowe as Kate
Jack P. Ranjo as Smudge
Matt Taylor as Ivan the sea urchin

About Surf's Up

The project at Sony, Surf’s Up, was looking for two directors. Chris Jenkins pitched us the idea – Ash and myself, although it was separately.

I fell in love with the idea. I thought doing a documentary – or ‘mockumentary,’ whatever, but it really is kind of an animated documentary – I thought was really unique and fun. I was a big fan of a lot of the reality shows on TV.

It just really spoke to me. Doing an animated movie like that – getting into the heads of an animated character, being able to do these talking head interviews along with all the action that we did – that sort of excited me the most. I also thought the penguins were as cute as can be. Then, surfing – I always wanted to surf. I’m trying to learn right now.

The technical end of it, I wasn’t too worried about, because I know the guys at Imageworks can do almost anything. They’re geniuses over there. We did say to them, ‘If we can’t do the water well, then we can’t do this movie.’ We were going to have so many waves and so much water. It just has to look great. Of course, they came up to the challenge. They did way better than I could have even dreamed.

Chris Buck "Directors Buck and Brannon on Surf’s Up", by Josh Armstrong, Animated Views, June 11, 2007.

External links

Wikipedia

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Surf's Up (film)