Title: Volcom Stone Presents: Football Shmootball Surf DVD

Featuring: Dave Riddle, Kai Garcia, Chava Greenlee, Tai Vandyke, Kamalei Alexander, Bruce Irons, Dave Wassel, Kaleo Roberson, Ozzie Wright, Gavin Beschen, and Clint Moncata

Studio: Epitaph

Length: 24:36 + Extra's

Reviewed by: Andy Hewitt

 

    Although I have had limited exposure to the sport of surfing, I have found it to be a very relaxing sport, and one I would love to try. Going in to my viewing of Football Shmootball, I had previously only seen the Jack Johnson surf videos Thicker Than Water, and The September Sessions. As the opening scenes of Football Shmootball rolled, I knew that I was in for a different experience than those of Jack Johnson’s films.

         

The DVD itself was shot in 16mm film, and was released not to long ago for the first time on DVD. The Volcom team was chilling at the “Volcom House” on the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii. The DVD documents the Volcom Team through their time at the house. The DVD is very much a documentary in the fact that it will show some footage of the team surfing, and then cut to different interviews with the members in to different aspects of the trip thus far.

 

The start of the movie was filled with scenes of partying and surfing. This was a lot different than I had expected, because both of Jack Johnson’s films were almost strictly surfing at different places around the world. This was chocked full of the surfing, and also took you along for the ride through a couple of the competitions that they competed in. You hear about different the different parties they are at, as well as things like one of the team members stealing one of the coaches car’s to go home.

 

The one thing that really threw me off in Football Shmootball, was the music. The soundtrack consists of Black Sabbath, Queens of the Stone Age, Bad Brains, Melvins, Ween, 2 Pac, Corrosion of Conformity, 400 Blows, and Digital Unicorn. Most of the music was fairly hard, and I personally don't think that it fit well in with the movie. Then again, I am also used to hearing more melodic music in surfing videos.

 

All in all, the Football Shmootball DVD was a new and unique experience for me. It showed some of the craziness involved in the lives of surfers, as well as some great surfing. Besides the soundtrack that accompanied the video, Football Shmootball helped broaden my horizons when it comes to surfing, as well as seeing the different realms of the people involved.