She Likes to Watch

What’s it all about?

They say you can never go home again.

They apparently never saw “Garden State.”

Andrew Largeman, or, “Large” as he’s known, has spent his entire adult in a drug-induced daze.

When he’s called home from Hollywood to attend his mother’s funeral, however, Large (Zach Braff) decides to ween himself off pills. New Jersey does the rest.

As he reconnects with friends (Peter Sarsgaard), spars with his distant dad (Ian Holm) and encounters an enchantingly odd girl (Natalie Portman), Large rediscovers the confusion, pain and rapture of being human.

Braff and Portman make endearing leads in this winsome film, which has just enough gentle quirkiness to keep “Garden State” from growing sugary.

If you’ve seen and liked Braff in NBC’s “Scrubs,” check out his more mature side in “Garden State.” If “Scrubs” annoys the hell out of you, this movie might have enough wry observations and indie tunes to win you over.

“Garden State” screens tonight at 7 and 9:15 p.m. at The Palm Theatre, 817 Palm St. in San Luis Obispo.

Tickets are $7.50.

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Mark your calendars for a free screening of “Surf’s Up” this Saturday in Atascadero.

An animated tale about surfing penguins, “Surf’s Up” came on the crest of a wave of penguin-related movies — “March of the Penguins,” “Madagascar,” “Happy Feet,” to name a few.

With great visuals and a winning storyline, however, it’s safe to say that “Surf’s Up” is the best of the bunch.

Shia LaBeouf lends his voice to Cody Maverick, a stoke-loving penguin who dreams of becoming a surf legend like his hero, Big Z.

Leaving the Arctic, he travels to Hawaii to compete in the Penguin World Surfing Championship alongside with goofball Chicken Joe (Jon Heder) and Tank, a pumped-up jock (Diedrich Bader) .

“Surf’s Up” is presented documentary-style, which makes for some behind-the-scenes fun when we watch the surfers flub interviews or Tank slobber over his trophies.

We also see plenty of cute baby penguins and fearsome sea life.

But the true draw of “Surf’s Up” is its spot-on voice casting. Jeff Bridges taps into his mellow “Big Lebowski” past to portray a laidback surf legend gone to seed.

“Surf’s Up” will be shown 8:15 p.m. Saturday at Sunken Gardens Park, 6500 Palma Ave. in Atascadero.

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There’s a Central Coast connection to “Surf’s Up.”

Dana Belben, who provides the voice of Cody’s mom, also worked as a script coordinator and backgrounds manager on the film. She graduated from San Luis Obispo High School in 1995.

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Photos courtesy of MovieWeb.com.

Ah, spring. The sun is shining, the birds are chirping, and spring cleaning is upon us.

While emptying the recycling bins here at Movies HQ, I found a few movie-related tidbits.

HopeDance magazine offers two more movies this month in its HopeDance FiLMs series.

First up is “Everything’s Cool”, a look at the history of global warming.
Filmmakers Daniel B. Gold and Judith Helfand examine the movement from the viewpoints of scientists, activists and politicians. Hear interviews with Bill McKibben, Ross Gelbspan and others.

“Everything’s Cool” will be screened at 7 p.m. Monday at the San Luis Obispo library, in San Luis Obispo. A $5 donation is encouraged.

On Wednesday, the film series takes a look at health care with “Cuba: An Accidental Revolution.”

The documentary, narrated by scientist/environmentalist David Suzuki, looks at the island nation’s surprisingly strong health care system.

It’s paired with the PBS documentary “Critical Care,” about U.S. health care.

Moviegoers are encouraged to donate $5 to $10.

“Cuba: An Accidental Revolution” and “Critical Care” play at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the San Luis Obispo library.

More information about both films is available at www.hopedance.org.

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The Palm Theatre in San Luis Obispo kicks off its new movie series on Wednesday with “Trainspotting.”

Palm Wednesdays will offer a different flick each Wednesday. The emphasis here is on cult classics: quirky comedies, action flicks and thrillers with a strong following among Generations X and Y.

Few movies fall into that category better than “Trainspotting,” Danny Boyles’ darkly comic look at the Edinburgh drug scene. It’s smart, slick and frequently pretty damn unsavory.

“Trainspotting” will screen at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the Palm Theatre, 817 Palm St. in San Luis Obispo.

Tickets are $7.50. You can also snag a six-movie pass for $35 — provided you buy it before Wednesday.

The series continues May 7 with the big-wave surfing documentary “Billabong Odyssey.” Check out the full list at www.thepalmtheatre.com.

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The San Luis Obispo International Film Festival drew more than 7,500 moviegoers, organizers said this week, the “best ever” in the festival’s 14-year history.

About 12 percent came from outside the county, said Wendy Eidson, the film festival’s executive director.

Top events at the film festival, which ran March 7 to 16, included a train-themed opening night, an awards ceremony honoring “Easy Rider” star Peter Fonda and Surf Night, featuring a tribute to pioneer surf filmmaker Bud Browne.

This year, festival organizers introduced Western Night and the Hollywood and Vines series, which pairs movies with local wineries. They also added venues in Santa Margarita, Paso Robles and Shell Beach.

For more information, visit www.slofilmfest.org.

When you think of body builders, you’re more likely to conjure images of Muscle Beach than Sunset Beach. Yet, legendary surfer Gerry Lopez did manage to get former Mr. Universe Arnold Schwarzenegger on a surf board in Hawaii one time.

“I took him surfing one time on Maui,” said Lopez, who appeared as the sidekick Subotai in the future governor’s 1982 movie “Conan the Barbarian.” “He paddled out fine, but when we got outside, he looked at me, got off the board, shoved it and said, ‘Ah – I think I go in by swimming.”

As we’ll note in tomorrow’s Ticket story, Lopez is one of several well-known surfers planning to attend Thursday’s tribute to film maker Bud Browne as part of the SLO International Film Festival’s Surf Night. To prepare for our preview, we talked to several of the guests. Here are some interesting tidbits that didn’t get into the story in today’s Tribune:

Gerry Lopez
The man known as Mr. Pipeline now lives in Bend, Oregon, 3 ½ hours away from the nearest beach, but he still gets out to surf whenever there’s a swell.

• What the movie “Five Summer Stories” did for Hawaii’s famous Pipeline: “Ruined it,” Lopez said with a chuckle. “Back then the Pipeline was kind of a side show. Sunset Beach was the main spot. That’s where all the best surfers went and that’s where all the best surfing happened. And that was really the most important spot during the winter season in Hawaii. Things started to change after ‘Five Summer Stories.’ The Pipeline started to become more and more popular . . . The Pipeline’s much more photographic than Sunset Beach. (But) it’s not necessarily a better wave.”

• On Honk, the band featured in “Five Summer Stories:” “Oh, great. I think they’re still together. They’re a bunch of old hippies now, but they’re a terrific band. Nobody had ever heard of them outside Laguna before that movie. . . After the movie, I got to meet all of them. We’d go and listen to them play and stuff – they were terrific.”

• On the Beach Boys, whose music also appears in the movie: “To real surfers, the Beach Boys were never really surf music,” he said. But he conceded: “They’re part of the culture.”

• When he took Schwarzenegger surfing, he let the action star use a board from the movie “Big Wednesday,” directed by John Milius, who wrote the famous surf scene in “Apocalypse Now.”

• Lopez was surprised to hear that Milius was partly the inspiration for the Walter character in “The Big Lebowski.” As soon as he heard, he called out to Grubby Clark, founder of Clark Foam, who was nearby. “Grubby – in ‘The Big Lebowski,’ remember Walter’s character by John Goodman? It’s supposed to be Milius!”

• Does anything about Walter remind him of Milius? “The .45 – that’s John’s favorite sidearm.”

• Like the other surfers we talked to for this story, Lopez has never surfed in San Luis Obispo County. (And, no, he doesn’t plan on bringing a board – at least that’s what he told us.)

Linda Benson
The 5-time U.S. champ went to Hawaii for the first time at 15, when she first meet Bud Browne.

• While a wigged Mickey Munoz was Gidget’s double in the original “Gidget” movie, Benson was the stunt double for the sequel, “Gidget Goes to Hawaiian.” “They were bad movies,” she said. “Many people feel that if Gidget’s dad (Frederick Kohner) never wrote the book and there was never a movie, maybe there wouldn’t be as many people surfing. But surfing has been on its own course. And everybody has a right to surf.”

• On surfing a 15-foot day when she was just 15 years old: “I paddled out at Waimea. Fred Van Dyke took off on a wave, he wiped out and his board broke in half. And John Severson wiped out. He popped up right near me. I’m just paddling out, and he looked at me and said, “You’re crazy. . .’ I got back to the beach, and I was kind of silly. I was stumbling and laughing. I did something that was kind of scary and I, of course, would never do it again.”

• On her friendship with Laird Hamilton’s mother: “I went to high school, and one of my best friend’s was Laird’s mom. My mom and dad used to take care of Laird. Laird’s mom was a single mom until she met Billy Hamilton, and I got her in those beach part movies. So my mom and dad took care of Laird when he was still in a baby bed.”

• She still surfs, but she prefers warmer water. “As with all of us, we absolutely hate this age thing because we were so active. I kind of say we’re all here, cleverly disguised as adults.”

We’ll have quotes from Peter Cole, Jack McCoy and Bud Browne in this blog tomorrow. Meanwhile, surf fans might also want to think about two other surf movies coming up.

“Five Summer Stories” not only features the music of Honk and the Beach Boys, it also features Lopez in some classic tubes. While very dated to the groovin’ 70s – when the shortboard era was in full swing — it’s still visually appealing. This one shows tomorrow at 4 p.m. at Downtown Cinemas in San Luis Obispo.

“Of Wind and Wave,” meanwhile, is a documentary about 94-year-old Woody Brown. Anyone who has seen “Surfing for Life” – another great surf flick – knows what a great character Brown is. Writer and director David Brown (what’s with all the Browns in surfing?) will attend the noon screening Saturday at La Perla del Mar in Pismo.

For more on those, visit the film fest’s web site.

– Pat P.

Photo (Of Benson and Browne) courtesy of Bud Browne

Trevor Povah wasn’t sure how local crowds would react to his surf movie, “Lost in the Middle.” But he got his answer last month when crowds lined up to see his 30-minute feature, which spotlights local surfers, surf spots and musicians.

More than 100 people had to be turned away at Downtown Brew, which is now bringing “Lost in the Middle” back for an encore presentation. (Sunday, 7 p.m., $8) The event will include live music and raffles.

Read about the movie here.

The folks at Downtown Brew, by the way, are now hosting a regular “Board Night” feature, which will entail screening movies about board sports. The next one, title yet to be determined, is set for Feb. 24.

Adding to their surf/board theme, DB will clear the stage for The Dentures, the county’s best-known surf band, Feb. 23.

In other entertainment news, Willie Nelson plays the Alex Madonna Expo tonight. The legendary country artist will be the second (Greg Allman) to perform at this venue.

-Pat P.

Photo: Trevor Povah

I may be a dork of great magnitude. Because I recently became pretty excited when I learned that Jeff Bridges was a surfer.

I mean, it just seemed so right: The guy who played The Dude in “The Big Lebowski” – and a penguin named Big Z in “Surf’s Up” — just had to surf.

An avid surfer in high school, the Santa Barbara resident apparently dropped out of the sport for about 25 years before recently returning to the lineup.

“It’s a wonderful metaphor, catching a wave, for how you look at other challenges in life,” he told moviesonline.com.

Right on, Dude.

So that got me thinking about other celebrities who surf. Back in the 30s, Jackie Coogan – a famous child actor who later gained fame as Uncle Fester in “The Addams Family” – was frequently found surfing Malibu. More recently, celebs like Paris Hilton, Jennifer Aniston, Ben Affleck and David Beckham have flirted with The Stoke. But Paris Hilton probably just wanted to be seen on a surf board. And Beckham’s insurance companies usually won’t permit him to play anything but soccer.

Still, there are plenty of celebrities who have really surfed. Here are a few:

• Chris Isaak. Isaak took up surfing later in life (his early 30s), but he got the fever in a big way. A friend of big wave surfer Doc Rennecker, he has often been spotted paddling out at the notoriously treacherous Nor-Cal spot, Maverick’s, on 15-foot days. “Surfing, if anything, helps me be relaxed enough so I can want to go back and write,” Isaak told the Tribune in 2003. “It just keeps you kind of mellow and balanced.”

• Ben Harper. Another surfing musician, Harper grew up a skater. But like Isaak, he gets musically inspired by the waves. “The ocean is extremely melodic,” he told Surfing Magazine. “Whenever I am in the ocean and paddling out, ideas come to me in a way that they don’t in other places. I think anybody who surfs will tell you, you hear music when you surf; it’s a weird phenomenon.”

• Adam Sandler. A regular in the Malibu line-up (when he’s not making gazillions on a movie), he’s known to be a decent surfer and a down-to-earth guy, even when guys in the lineup pitch movie ideas to him.

• Aaron Carter. The ‘tween heartthrob was hospitalized after a “minor surf accident” that required brief hospitalization in San Diego last year.

• Bruce Springsteen. Springsteen was known to surf the Jersey shores as a kid. I’m not sure if he still does surf, but in the book “Springsteen: Songs,” there’s a photo of an adult Springsteen sitting in front of three surfboards at his home.

• Cameron Diaz. (That’s her at the top in a still photo from “Charlie’s Angels”) A good friend of surf legend Kelly Slater, she told Self Magazine: “Surfing is a religious experience for me. You get to be a part of Mother Nature and experience its power. I have great respect for the ocean. It’s full of life and its energy is constant. When you ride a wave, it comes from across the ocean, from 1,500 miles away, and you get on it and ride it to shore, where its journey ends.”

• Jack Johnson. During my surf trip to San Onofre last summer, the campground was alive with the music of Jack Johnson, whose mellow tunes provide the soundtrack for many surfers. A former pro surfer, he frequently writes music on surf trips.

• Minnie Driver. According to various accounts, Driver, seen surfing in this video, once nearly got pounded by another surfer in the lineup. She was about to yell at the surfer when, upon a closer look, she saw it was Bruce Willis.

* Orlando Bloom. Well, I don’t know a whole lot about Bloom’s surfing abilities. But here’s a shot of him on a decent-looking wave in Hawaii.

• Eddie Vedder. With all his dark and moody Pearl Jam lyrics, you might be surprised to learn that Vedder is a ukulele-playing surfer. But he turned to the waves, in part, as a reaction to a tumultuous childhood. When asked the difference between performing for a packed house and riding big waves, he told Outside Magazine: “With a packed house, unless you say something incredibly offensive to God or country, a crowd of 15,000 people will not kill you. I guess they could if they wanted to, but they will not all jump on you at the same time and hold you down for two minutes. That’s the difference between a big crowd and a big wave. When Kelly (Slater) takes me to Waimea Bay, that wave does not give a sh– who I am.”
–Pat P.

NOTE: Today’s blog is presented Larry King-style, with bolded names and entries that have no connection to each other.

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OK, I have a confession to make.

I went to the movie “Surf’s Up” over the weekend on the premise that I thought our 3-year-old daughter would like it. But in reality I just really wanted to see it myself.

And wow. How fun. If you’re a fan of surfing or “The Big Lebowski” — or even if you’re one of those weird, into-penguins people — you’ll get a huge kick out of this.

I’ve seen quite a few surf movies, and I have to say “Surf’s Up” is better than many. First of all, it has a story. And secondly, believe it or not, I think it captures the surfing experience far better than, say, “Blue Crush.” (Don’t laugh – it was work-related!) You really sense this as Cody — a surfing penguin — barely paddles over his first big wave in the “Big Z Memorial” contest. But beyond that it captures the vibe so well, the writers have to be surfers themselves.

Maybe I’ll look it up sometime. But not now.

Also noteworthy was Jeff Bridges, whose character is basically The Dude from “Big Lebowski” — that is, if the Dude was a big fat penguin who can charge giant waves like Laird Hamilton, except that he doesn’t have the nice tan Laird has.

I wasn’t surprised to see lots of kids in the crowd. But I figured there’d be more surfers. The film features several nods to popular surf movies like “Step Into Liquid” and “Riding Giants.” And it’s definitely not all kid humor.

Besides, that surfing chicken? HILARIOUS!

And, yeah — my daughter liked it, too.

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Speaking of my daughter, getting a 3-year-old ready for a musical is quite a challenge. On Sunday, Sunny performed in “Peter Pan,” put on by the Pacific Dance Center, at the Spanos Theater. It was a small part, of course — she’s only three — but I think it’s important for her to experience being in front of a crowd. And I want to support the studio.

The problem is, the play started around 3 p.m., which is pretty much smack in the middle of Sunny’s nap time. In fact, it’s pretty much smack in the middle of every 3-year-old’s nap time, which is why you don’t want to be in a dressing room full of 3-year-olds at 3 p.m. By the time they went on stage, I was ready for a nap.

But they pulled it off. And, unlike in last winter’s “A Nightmare Before Christmas,” Sunny didn’t hit anyone in the head with a shoe this time.

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The new album by Wilco is pretty great, by the way. Jeff Tweedy’s voice often sounds like John Lennon’s on this one, and there are some terrific, but not overdone guitar solos. This is a mellow album with insightful lyrics. That it was atop the Billboard charts recently restores a little faith in the music industry, even though I still think it’s awful.
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I was happy to see in our recent online poll that no one thought The Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart Club Band” was “vastly overrated” or “the worst album ever.” (55% thought it was the best ever.)

Granted, 40 responses doesn’t exactly meet Gallup Poll standards. Still, I would’ve been discouraged if anyone didn’t like this Beatles masterpiece.

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If you want to talk about overrated albums, though, I’d like to nominate Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon.” I mean, I dig the concept, and I can appreciate innovation in sound. But the album just . . . bores me.

In fact, rumor has it that if you play the film “Wizard of Oz” to “Dark Side of the Moon,” the album still really sucks.

Yet, classic rock stations just can‘t get enough Floyd.

So, at the risk of upsetting stoners with Floyd flags hanging from their ceiling, I’d like to propose a 5-year radio moratorium on Pink Floyd.

And as soon as it comes out on DVD, I’m going to recommend you play “Surf’s Up” to the Beach Boys’s “Pet Sounds.” Now that’s trippy.

— Pat P.

So I have a couple of beefs about the film festival’s Surf Night event at the Fremont Theatre last night:

First of all, the Q&A, featuring filmmakers Bruce, Dana and Wes Brown, along with surfer Robert “Wingnut” Weaver, was largely disappointing.
If you have a panel of guests, you need a moderator who will ask good questions — which, of course, requires some preparation. Audience questions are always an iffy proposition too, because people are generally afraid to ask questions in front of a big crowd.

So last night, the panel fielded boring questions like, “What’s your next movie about?” and “How long did it take you to make ‘Step Into Liquid?’ ”

Blah.

Since the guest panel is arguably what prompted the $25 ticket price, they have to be interesting. I have a few suggestions to maximize the enjoyment:

1.) Have a moderator who’s a skilled interviewer, who will prepare thoughtful questions ahead of time.

2.) Have audience members submit questions that can be screened before the show. The moderator can then read them.

OK, I got that out of the way. My second beef is more technical: “Chasing Dora,” the second feature, skipped numerous times, which interrupted the flow of the film. Not sure what could be done to prevent that. I know FuelTV, which owns the rights to the movie, is pretty strict on how it can be screened so there might not even be a lot of copies available.

That said, it was still a thrill to attend the event. Dana Brown’s “Step Into Liquid” aptly carries on the torch passed on by his father, Bruce, creator of “The Endless Summer.” And it’s a blast to see the big wave segments on the big screen.
Dana’s son, Wes, is also off to a promising start. His “Chasing Dora,” made with T.J. Barrack, was a low-budget flick — and certainly no “Endless Summer.” But it incorporates the elements needed for a good surf movie — creative photography, insightful interviews and, most importantly, a good story.

The guests stuck around for a meet-and-greet afterward, which was a nice opportunity for audience members to ask their own questions, one-on-one. I met Bruce Brown personally and asked him what he did after “Endless Summer” — a movie that made him both famous and wealthy.

He made a few more movies, of course (including “On Any Sunday,” a documentary with Steve McQueen), but mostly he kicked back and enjoyed the ride.

“I was a surfer,” he said, matter-of-factly. “I didn’t have to work anymore, so I had fun.”

Now that’s the way to do it.

I told Bruce it’d be great to have him narrate one of his old movies live, just like he did in the old days.

“I probably wouldn’t remember anything,” he joked, standing beside one of the old woody station wagons parked outside the theater.

That’s OK. It wouldn’t matter if he remembered anything; I’d just be happy to step back in time and hear Bruce hold court for a while.

–Pat P.

Tomorrow, Bruce, Dana and Wes Brown–the famed filmmakers of numerous surf movies from “The Endless Summer” to the current “Chasing Dora”–will be at the Fremont theatre for the film festival’s surf night.
I feel a slight connection to the family’s films so I’ll be in the audience.
Growing up in San Diego, I began surfing in junior high with my other pre-teen girlfriends. We weren’t great — or even close to that — but we could stand up, go down the line and turn our neon-colored boards a bit.
My friends and I enjoyed hanging out in our bikinis more than searching for big waves. Our ideal wave was about 3 feet high and was ‘slow and crumbly,’ as we liked to describe it. To some surfers, that’s a wave they don’t bother to surf.
But we were among the generation of new female surfers — there were few of us and people noticed when we paddled out. At least we were out there.
When the Browns released “The Endless Summer 2,” my friends and I got a special invite to a premiere showing. There wasn’t much of a red carpet, but we wore our most surfer-like outfits and enjoyed every moment of it.
We laughed at the jokes in the movies and felt like we understood the wipeouts. We developed crushes on the movie’s lead surfers, Wingnut (who will be here Thursday) and Pat O’Connell.
I also developed a huge respect and admiration for the Browns, who make thoughtful and inspiring movies over and over again.
So, I’ll be in the audience Thursday night to enjoy two movies about surfers and to reminisce about the good ol’ days, when I was one of them.
There are a few tickets left for Surf Night — a red carpet event with screenings of “Chasing Dora” and “Step into Liquid.” It starts at 7 p.m. — visit the film festival headquarters at 861 Palm St. in San Luis Obispo or call 546-3456. Tickets are $25 or $20 for pass holders.
–Dawn R.

I’ve had a few calls from people asking me about ticket availability for Surf Night at the SLO Film Festival, which leads me to two important points:
1.) I DO NOT WORK FOR THE FILM FESTIVAL!!! Therefore, I don’t know about ticket availability any more than you do. If you really want to know if tickets are available, call the film festival (546-3456) and ask them. They’ll even sell you tickets.
2.) Okay, I kind’ve lied in No. 1. Because while I DO NOT WORK FOR THE FILM FESTIVAL, I did stop by the office to buy a couple of tickets for Surf Night yesterday, and I was told that the event is close to a sellout. So if you want to see that 66-foot wave on the big screen, drop by the Film Fest office (across from the Palm Street parking garage) today. Tell them I sent you. Better yet, buy me a couple of tickets; I think the in-laws are interested.

If you want to build your stoke before the movie, check out some fun photos of local surfers along the North Coast. I don’t know who takes the photos, but they’re really good. And if you ever surf Cayucos Pier, you might be surprised to find a photo of yourself here.

Getting back to the film fest, tickets are still available for Saturday’s tribute to James Cromwell. The event includes a screening of the noir film “L.A. Confidential,” in which Cromwell plays a bad cop.

–Pat P.