The greatest movie ever made..!

Strictly average movie

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

This might not be the best movie ever, but I think the critics on this is missing something that most of the viewers apparently have gotten :) This is a heartwarming film, about a special individual that had passion, excitement about and was a natural at surfing.Jay Moriarity played by Jonny Weston is this boy that grows up wanting nothing else then surfing waves and big ones at that if possible, Frosty played Gerard Butler is the mentor that is though but fair and want him to learn that this is not for everyone and you have to practice to be perfect, if you are not perfect or well trained you will not survive the mavericks.I find surfing fascinating, it looks very cool and the surfers look very alive when surfing. I guess this is a very real tale about how it is, how it feels and how it looks to them selves and everyone around them. But also a film about taking risks, experience new things and being yourself.

As you might expect, Chasing Mavericks follows the same relative storyline of classic sports movies like Rocky and Karate Kid. The individual athlete, competitor, or whatever you want to call them tries to achieve the nearly impossible and still manage the rest of their lives. The one difference from the two above movies and Mavericks is that the latter is a true story, which makes a lot of the way it's set up different because you've got to deal with the factual stuff and get the other subplots of the kid's life and whatever.The basic plot is pretty well explained in the trailer. The teenage surfer, Jay, wants to ride one of the biggest waves in existence, and he gets the local surfing legend, Frosty, to train him for it. As he's training he has to deal with problems with his friend, though I never fully understood what the tension between was caused by, and his relationship with Kim. Both of these subplots could have been incorporated better. Frosty has some domestic issues in spending more time with his kids instead of surfing obsessively, which becomes a subplot as well. The main line of action was put together pretty well, but the subplots were kind of sloppy. I guess they kind of had to add them in since it had to be true to the real kid's life, but from a strictly cinematic perspective, they probably would have done better to leave all subplots out completely even though that might make for a kind of bland story. The main issue with all the subplots is that they are underdeveloped. Frosty needing to be a better dad is touched upon like it's going to be important, but then gets left alone. Jay's mom is given probably too little screen time considering that her problems were probably pretty important in Jay's life. And the scene at the beginning where the one nameless character beats her up didn't contribute to anything and probably should have been cut or if not explained a little better. The ending was pretty solid. I'd been told beforehand that Jay dies at the end, but I wasn't told how he died, so I thought he might have died when he goes under when surfing Mavericks. The suspense of that scene was pretty good, and was probably true to the real event. His eventual death wasn't done quite as well, but neither was it done poorly.The characters are a pretty big factor, but the only ones with any true development are Jay, Frosty, Kim, Frosty's wife Brenna. Jay is written pretty well and we can see him grow throughout the movie, though the acting for his part could have been a little better. Frosty's character has the inverse problems of Jay's since he's played well by Gerald Butler, but is poorly scripted in the sense that he's basically always ticked off at Jay, or surfing, or life in general. Brenna dies about three-quarters through the movie, which I didn't think was such a great idea for the storyline unless she actually did die at that point in time. Kim gets a decent amount of screen time, but she's also written with shaky proficiency. I would say that her character should have been left out completely, but since she ended up marrying Jay I guess they couldn't do that. Her relationship with Jay progresses a lot like the one in the '02 Spiderman, where Mary Jane just suddenly realizes that Peter's the one for her after talking to him like twice, though of course here we don't have the alter ego issue.For technical execution, it did decently. The surfing scenes were pretty well done, though you can tell they probably used more than a few sequences with GoPros, and they didn't include so many of them that it would turn off non-surfing fans. Jay's training was pretty well done too, and each of the different training scenes were a good length and included at palatable intervals. The soundtrack includes a lot of alternative music, most likely from the nineties. The script and acting were C+ to B- level. None of the camera-work is spectacular at any point.I don't know if I would recommend this to surfing fans, but I will say that it isn't like Soul Surfer and doesn't try to be despite their similarities. If you're a fan of inspirational sports movies, true or not, it definitely fits that genre. It's not really my scene, but in terms of the genre, I would say it's about average, maybe a little bit below average. It's not a bad family movie, though you might have some trouble coming across a DVD copy of it. To a completely unbiased prospective viewer, I would say: consider it, but not too strongly. Overall Rating: 6.8/10.

We came from the sea? That piece of lunacy starts the movie and it goes down from there. Celebrating the life of someone who was reckless, foolish, selfish, careless, and thoughtless. He went free diving by himself in a strange place. Did I mention foolish? If anything this is an example of how not to live. Just look at all the young men his age that die when they crash their cars racing, speeding, etc. They wrap them around posts, trees, etc. We don't produce movies glorifying the men who kill themselves doing the same reckless things. And we shouldn't have done this movie either.This shows how tragic it is when men abandon their wives. What it does to their family. It is no wonder we have so many tragic deaths of young men, when we glorify people who kill themselves being foolish.

In this case that means I'm not sure what to say. Bits and pieces of this movie work but I can't say the same for the way it all fits together. They try to tell story of a child with absentee dad, obsessed with surfing and more specifically a menacing break in N California known as Mavericks. He is eventually mentored by gruff local surfer named Frosty. The main characters are all aptly played, Butler in particular as Frosty. Some of the surfing footage is well done and attractive. But the movie doesn't give us any insight on why the characters say or do the sometimes odd things they say or do. And it's also very episodic - this happens, then that happens, then that happens - without a bridge between the events or a sense of elapsed time. I like a surfing movie as much as the next guy or maybe more, but this was more of a tease than the real deal.