Film

Riding Giants

Name: Riding Giants
Genre: Documentary
Released: 2004
Cast: Jeff Clark, Darrick Doerner, Laird Hamilton, Dave Kalama, David H. Kalama Jr.

Stacy Peralta's love letter to the outsiders who turned death-defying big-wave surfing into an art form, tracing the sport from 1950s Waimea pioneers to the tow-in era of Laird Hamilton. Told through the surfers themselves, it's part oral history, part hagiography—reverent, funny, occasionally awestruck by its own subjects. Good for anyone who wants to understand obsession, or just watch enormous waves try to kill people.

TMDb rating

7.6

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Same white-knuckle wonder—someone risking death for a private, near-wordless kind of mastery, filmed with the same reverence Peralta brings to giant waves. Alex Honnold's calm is as unsettling as any wipeout.

But Climbing, not surfing, and the tension is claustrophobic rather than exhilarating—less party, more held breath.

Dogtown and Z-Boys2002

Peralta's earlier documentary, same scrappy structure and rock-and-roll editing, tracing skateboarding's outlaw roots the way Riding Giants traces surfing's. His voice is unmistakable from the first frame.

But You'll recognize the tricks—talking heads, archival grain, hero-worship—because it's the same director's template, just with wheels instead of water.

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Pure adrenaline cinema, bank robbers and bronzed idealists chasing the perfect wave, distilling the surf-as-religion myth Riding Giants treats with a straight face, but here played for glorious excess.

But It's a Keanu Reeves action movie, not a documentary, so don't expect nuance—just skydiving, shootouts, and shirtless philosophy.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

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The original surf pilgrimage film, two guys circling the globe chasing an endless summer of waves, shot in the innocent, funny, low-fi style that invented the genre Riding Giants inherits.

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Dramatizes the true story of teenage big-wave surfer Jay Moriarity, mentored to ride the same California break Riding Giants immortalizes. Sentimental but sincere about the mentorship at its core.

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A cheesy, beloved 80s surf drama where an Arizona wave-pool champion gets humbled by Oahu locals—a fictional, funnier cousin to the culture clash Riding Giants documents for real.

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