The Endless Winter - Review

Top professional Cornish surfers Mark ‘Igor’ Harris and Mitch Corbett are on a mission, a mission to discover the roots of surfing in the UK. Along the way they meet the iconic locals who went on to become legends and get to grips with what makes British surfing so special. The product of this journey is ‘The Endless Winter’, and what a journey it is.

“We wanted to make a film that British surfers could be proud of,” says producer Matt Crocker who, along with James Dean, is responsible for the movie.  And that they have done. The film is both interesting and informative, avoiding the Cornwall-heavy bias of many British surf films by including many spots such as the Gower, Brighton and Thurso East.

 

 

The film’s tagline is ‘A very British surf movie’, and it certainly goes to fill a gap in a market oversaturated with footage of warm water barrels in exotic locations. British surfing has evolved on its own terms and in its own time and the resulting eccentric characters and hardcore surfing community is covered well. 

Igor and Mitch come across as genuinely nice guys and connect well with those they are interviewing, such as surfing icons Pete ‘PJ’ Jones, Spencer Hargraves and Nigel Semmens. They reveal what UK surfing was like at its birth, such as the ridiculousness of surfing in a woolly jumper in January, whilst tackling more sensitive issues, such as the suicide of promising young surfer Nigel Veitch who dived off the cliffs at Tynemouth after losing his sponsor. The story is handled well and goes to show that getting British surfers on the map, not to mention the rankings, was not all plain sailing.

 Memorable scenes include when Igor and Mitch join ‘The Muddy Brothers’ by surfing the Severn Bore tidal wave in total darkness, and the section on Sennen’s legendary Skewjack Surf Camp. The film also reveals some surprising facts, such as surfing’s link to Agatha Christie, King Edward 8^th and Captain James Cook, as well as the effect of the World Wars on the surfing community.  

It’s had a positive reception, it won Best British Film at the 2012 London Surf/Film Festival and enjoyed outdoor premiers all over the UK.  The soundtrack isn’t bad either; featuring the obvious, but still good, Devonshire surfer Ben Howard as well as others, such as The Fairport Convention and the imaginatively named Hotel Flamingo (I’d never heard of them either). It also includes black and white film footage as well as animations, courtesy of Simon Ball.

But there are problems. The in-water footage leaves a lot to desired, it’s shaky and unsteady and a couple of times during the Badlands section it even gets jammed into the sand, leaving viewers with an invigorating few seconds of Cornish seaweed. The film could have also done with some more footage of women surfers and groms, of which Britain has many, and excellent ones at that.

 

However, my main bugbear is that the production team are not surfers. Let me reiterate that, these guys don’t surf. In fact, in ‘The Making Of’ section, they admit that they found it hard when filming to anticipate the surfers’ next move on the wave, their lack of knowledge being so. It seems strange to have outsiders documenting and commenting on a community which is so notoriously insular and close-knit. Those of us who were not lucky enough to grow up surfing know how intimidating it can be at the beginning– the language, rules, hierarchy, etiquette, not to mention the sometimes aggressive localism. The well-worn idiom of ‘Only a surfer knows the feeling’ seems to be tested by this DVD.  

But they do make any effort to stick to just the main spots and don’t reveal any that viewers wouldn’t know about already. I wonder how much of that decision was based on the surfers’ code rather than the risk of getting their windscreen waxed or face the backlash from revealing a secret spot. Plus, when they approached and met the featured local surfers, who are legends in the surfing world, I wonder if they had the same deep-set respect and admiration that a surfer would have.  

On the flip side, it means that even those who are not surfers can understand, appreciate and be inspired by the film. And along with the 30 minutes of extras, the film is definitely worth a watch. It really does encapsulate what makes British surfing unique, the history and evolution surfing in the UK, and the fact that the never ending search for the perfect wave has been with us from the very beginning.

The Endless Winter trailer

Shipwreck Poem

There's a shipwreck called The Lucy off the coast of Pembrokeshire (near Skomer Island) which I dived a couple of years ago, you can find out some more information about it here.

I remember the day quite vividly as on the dive after this, a seal swam up to me and was playing with my fins for about 5 minutes, it was amazing! Then he swam to the surface and just floated there watching us - incredible.

This poem is actually inspired by the poem 'Inchape Rock' by Robert Southey, which was written in 1820. I remember hearing it as a child and was always struck by the imagery of the bell floating deeper and deeper. Creepy.

So here is my take; due to artistic licensing I left out the fact that once I got the surface, I was really seasick and puked and puked and puked.

So, without further ado (feel free to comment, I don't think you need to join anymore!):

Me in my dive gear on a different dive but you know, it sets the mood.

The Lucy

You tumble back into the waves,

forty metres down, Lucy waits.

She’s sat there since the 60s,

but you’ve never met before.

The hazard orange, floating bauble

sits as surface evidence,

of the hidden, deeper secrets

to which it is shackled.

Her name is scrawled across the buoy

that marks her final resting place,

which you’ll use to navigate to her

in the brimstone treacle depths.

So, you slip beneath the surface

where the warm sun cannot follow,

and from red the colours fade.

You plummet slow to shaded depths.

When you have no point of reference

your mind struggles for a mark,

to put its worried self at ease

amongst the silted, gravy water.

Imagined creatures spiral

in the gloom just out of view,

tantalising your periphery,

fabricating looming shadows.

Your left hand feeds the buoy line,

ripcord-taut against the tide,

its recurring jerks and bucks

warn of skyward rolling swell.

As you sink you feel the fingers

of a seeping thermo cline,

its slicing cold snips at the skin

that sits exposed around your mask.

You see the signal trail of bubbles

from your buddy just below,

this cyclic clue of exhalation

becomes a welcome sign of life.

Down here the only discord

is the rasping of your breath,

through the tanks and tubes and pipes

of your artificial lungs.

As you descend you check your gauge,

work out depth, air and direction.

Take out your torch, its blade of light

blunt insufficient in the smog.

And then,

Her rusted bow.

She seems so solid in the dark,

sat blinking from your torch,

in her nightgown of anemones

that soften all her corners.

The crab and wrasse and dogfish,

are her pelagic chaperone.

She’s tickled by Bristle star,

and flanked by hurried cuttles,

the sea fans hide her blush.

A lace of Dead Man’s Fingers.

In ascent I train my torch down,

to watch her evanesce.

Until she fades from my beam,

And shuts her eyes once more.

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