Surfwise 2007

"Doc" Paskowitz is the thriving 84-year-old patriarch of a famous surfing family. A PhD scholar and one of the sport‘s originating legends, Doc raised his nine children in a 24-foot campervan on various beaches across the United States, Mexico, Hawaii, and Israel. He enforced a holistic lifestyle, living off the land with few luxuries. The children‘s only duty was to surf. Years later, lacking any formal education, the kids are struggling to make a living: but Doc is still enjoying his daily surf. Director Doug Pray‘s (Hype!, Scratch) portrait of his larger-than-life subject and the family who "lived the dream" is highly entertaining - and stimulatingly ambivalent. — BG

"A wonderfully engaging look at love and family and the relentless pursuit of happiness, personal meaning and perfect waves... Few [documentary subjects] live up to their screen time as easily as Doc, a born pitchman, part carny, part evangelical, who even in his 80s continues to spread the Paskowitz gospel (clean living, clean surfing) with fervor." — Manohla Dargis, NY Times