'BREATH' which I saw earlier this week is an Australian film Directed, Co-Produced, Co-Written for the screen and stars Aussie Simon Baker, who is perhaps best known for his lead roles in TV's long running series 'The Guardian' and 'The Mentalist'. Based on multi-award winning author Tim Winton's international best selling book of the same name, the film saw its Premier at TIFF back in September last year, went on release in Australia last week, and in the US in early June. Based and filmed in and around the Western Australian coastal town of Denmark in the Great Southern Region, and the Directorial debut for Simon Baker, Tim Winton who also collaborated on the Screenplay stated that 'The Great Southern region has had an enormous impact on my life and work so I'm very pleased this film is being shot on the beaches and streets and forests that inspired the book'.Set in the early 1970's in a remote Western Australian town, the film charts the story of two young impressionable teenage lads Bruce 'Pikelet' Pike (Samson Coulter) and Ivan 'Loonie' Loon, (Ben Spence) who by accident discover a love of surfing and of the ocean. Pikelet is the more grounded, caring, responsible and respectful young teenager of the two, who comes from a stable family unit, a supportive mother (Rachael Blake) and father (Richard Roxburgh), a good home, and attends school dutifully. His best mate Loonie on the other hand is a rebellious, devil may care, opinionated, outspoken bulletproof wild child who from time to time gets beaten up by his Dad.
When they are first introduced to the surf down at a secluded beach by a bunch of older surfer dudes, they are aghast at the motion of the water and the surfers almost 'dancing on water'. From that time they are hooked, and their first self teaching lessons are on old styrofoam boards that they carve a hole into and insert a fin which they seal with melted candle wax. Such is their enthusiasm to give it a go. They soon yearn to graduate to proper fibreglass boards, and through working odd jobs save up enough cash to purchase two well worn second hand boards from a dubious local.
And out they go, soon getting noticed for their commitment and enthusiastic approach by Sando (Simon Baker) a somewhat dishevelled surfer who makes big wave riding look like a walk in the park. Sando offers the boys a ride home in his truck and offers to let them stash their boards at his place which is just down the road to save them from lugging their cumbersome boards to and from home everyday on their bikes. Initially, they take Sando for just another local hippie surfer type living in a ramshackle beach hut tucked away in a clearing in the forest.
One day when returning to collect their boards at Sando's place, Eva placed a box containing old surfing magazines with Sando on the front cover of numerous publications. They come to realise that Sando was a former international surf champion, a fact that he is keen to gloss over. At the same time, Sando reveals that Eva was a former down hill ski champion, who suffered a very bad knee injury which put an end to her skiing career, for which she is still undergoing surgical treatment. This explains her frosty temperament.
As the year progresses, Pikelet continues to attend school responsibly but is often distracted by thoughts of his new found love of surfing, and the advances of Queenie (Miranda Frangou) a girlfriend, of sorts, although that relationship is somewhat one sided. Loonie breaks his arm as a result of being thrown down the stairs at home by his father. This puts him out of the surfing action for six weeks, and sidelined while Sando and Pikelet live the surfing dream. One day while out in a particularly big surf break alone, Sando challenges Pikelet to a right of passage to which the young lad gingerly agrees and ultimately proves himself, while a dejected Loonie looks on secretly from the beach.
With Eva home alone, Pikelet soon forms a close bond with her, offering him another right of passage into manhood which becomes a regular thing while Sando is away. He becomes more infatuated with Eva even saying that he loves her, which she shrugs off instantly saying that it's the sex that he's in love with, and that he's way too young to even know the meaning of the word. On their last encounter Pikelet notices Eva starring in the mirror and stroking her stomach, which he has noticed is somewhat bulging. He asks if she is pregnant to which she responds positively. Is it mine he asks, to which she responds with a no, but Pikelet is unconvinced. He runs off to take solace in the surf, in which he is dumped on by a giant wave and loses his board - one given to him by Sando previously. Later, Sando and Loonie have returned from their surfing odyssey, and meeting Pikelet out of school, Sando announces that he is going to be a father. Pikelet congratulates him, in a stilted manner as though he suspects that Sando knows more than he is letting on. Sando says that his board was retrieved 25kms out to sea by a fishing boat and returned to him, and that surf is going to be up on Sunday morning and that he'll pick up the boys at dawn and to be ready. On the morning Loonie is sat next to Sando in the truck, keenly awaiting for the arrival of Pikelet. When he shows he declines to join them, sparking their derision, to which he retorts that just because he declines does not make him fearful or any less of a surfer, and they should accept that he has the right.
A closing voiceover of a now adult Pikelet says that he lost contact with his good friend Loonie but had heard that he wound up dead, face down in the surf with a bullet in the back of his head as a result of a drug deal gone wrong, and despite his chosen path, he still misses his friend.
'Breath' is a film about surfing, without is being about surfing. Sure there are some memorable scenes featuring vast walls of water down which Sando, Pikelet and Loonie cascade down, and equally impressive shots of the breaking waves taken looking upwards from under the water. Surfing is the glue that binds the central characters together and gives them reason to be united in their pursuit of their favoured pastime. But this is more a film about two young impressionable boys growing up in the early '70's and how their lives are changed forever by two adults, making this a personal, emotional and thoughtful coming of age story with heart and soul, rendering it relatable and believable. For his Directorial debut Simon Baker scores highly and reveals what a multi-talented artist he is both in front of the camera and behind it too. The two other central characters of Pikelet and Loonie are played with much future promise by the two young aspiring first time Actors Coulter and Spence, who bring a grounded realism to their performances that is nuanced and considered. Certainly worth the price of your ticket and worth seeing on the big screen for the surfing shots and the rugged beauty of some of Australia's fine coastal waters, but also too for the engaging story. This film merits four claps of the clapperboard, out of a possible five.
-Steve, at Odeon Online-
