The Endless Summer - Development

Development

Bruce Brown started surfing in the early 1950s. He took still photographs to show his mother what the draw of the sport was. While serving in the United States Navy on Oahu years later, he used an 8 mm movie camera to photograph surfers from California. Once Brown got back to the state, he edited his footage into an hour-long film. Surfer Dale Velzy showed it at his San Clemente shop, charging 25 cents for admission. Velzy bought Brown a 16 mm camera and together they raised $5,000 to make Slippery When Wet, Brown's first "real" surf film.

In the winter of 1958, Brown went back to Hawaii to film the North Shore's big surf. On the plane ride over, the novice filmmaker read a book about how to make movies. Brown said, "I never had formal training in filmmaking and that probably worked to my advantage". By 1962, he had spent five years making one surf film per year. He would shoot during the fall and winter months, edit during the spring and show the finished product during the summer. Brown remembered, "I felt if I could take two years to make a film, maybe I could make something special". To do this, he would need a bigger budget than he had on previous films. To raise the $50,000 budget for The Endless Summer, Brown took the best footage from his four previous films and made Waterlogged.

Brown took his completed film to several Hollywood studio distributors but was rejected because they did not think it would have mainstream appeal. In January, he took The Endless Summer to Wichita, Kansas for two weeks where moviegoers lined up in snowy weather in the middle of winter and it went on to selling out multiple screenings. Distributors were still not convinced and Brown rented a theater in New York City where his film ran successfully for a year. After the success of the run at New York's Kips Bay Theater, Don Rugoff of Cinema 5 distribution said he did not want the film or poster changed and wanted them distributed as is, thus Brown selected him over other distributors who wished to alter the poster.