Trailer: The Search for Freedom

Posted on May 26, 2015 at 12:19 pm

This new documentary tells the stories of the athletes who seek the freedom that comes from living in the moment and doing what makes us feel the most alive. This documentary written and directed by Jon Long (IMAX® Extreme) is about the infinite possibilities available to anyone willing to drop in. It’s a visceral, visual experience via some of the brightest pioneers, legends, visionaries and champions of surfing, snowboarding, skiing, skateboarding, mountain biking and more.

Ski film Godfather Warren Miller explains that, “The basic instinct of a human being is his search for freedom.” The film explores how living in the moment and doing what makes you feel most alive can be key to that freedom. On the surface, The Search for Freedom might appear to be about sports, or chasing thrills, but it is about so much more. It’s about feeling that pull of nature and wanting to go deeper into that element, that ocean.

Many claim that the freedom experienced when you are riding a moving wave, becoming part of that wave for an instant, is impossible to shake. It’s a state of grace. And it’s the same whether you’re sliding on snow, skateboarding on concrete, or mountain biking through a rainforest.

Veteran surf publisher Steve Pezman taps into the source: “The wave is forming in front of you, the wave is over your head, your wake is disappearing, your footprints are washed from the beach. There’s no material production from having done it. There’s no depletion. There’s no creation. It’s just an aesthetic instant.” That aesthetic instant is the real subject of The Search for Freedom.

Interview: Dude Perfect’s Tyler Toney

Posted on May 15, 2015 at 3:06 pm

Dude Perfect is the second largest sports channel on YouTube, with over 4.5 million subscribers and more than 556 million views. (2021 update: over 56 million subscribers!)

They are a group of five best friends (plus a panda) from Texas who love sports, comedy and living a positive and faith-based life. Their channel is best known for their trick shots, “stereotypes” parodies, and athletes + Dude Perfect videos. They are committed to living and sharing their faith, and their charitable work includes Nothing but Nets, Compassion International, and Herobox.

“We basically started six years ago kind of on accident,” Dude Tyler Toney told me in a phone interview. They were all living together and enjoyed hanging out and playing games. “We weren’t really planning on making a viral video or even making a business model out of our first video. We were in the backyard in college and we just started shooting these basketball shots. It was an all grass backyard so we didn’t couldn’t really play actual games or anything. So we decided to get the video camera out and everybody wanted to top each others shots. Pretty soon we had a video and Good morning America called two days later and wanted to air it on TV.”

They have performed some wild trick shots and stunts. “I would say the hardest was one probably the first sling shot that we did. We basically went out in my families’ ranch and we had cut down this tree and basically made like a duct tape pouch and this thing would launch the basketball like 100 yards. So with the wind in the way that the ball was released out of the pouch it was pretty hard shot. So when that one finally went in we were pretty excited about that. We started filming about 2 o’clock and filmed till dark and then got up the next morning and probably made it around lunch time so that’s was probably the longest it had taken us to make a shot.”

The Dudes are very excited about all of the athlete and performing artist guest stars who have appeared in their videos. “I continue to keep being blown away at how awesome so many of these athletes and celebrities are and how great the personalities they have are. I mean Russell Wilson and Tim McGraw those guys were both actually incredible. Coach Carroll was awesome to work with. We got to do that thing with Odell Beckham Jr. for the Superbowl this year which was absolutely incredible. You’re just constantly reminded of how talented and how incredible these guys are when you get to see them in person. I always think the most recent one was actually the most impressive.”

“We’re really looking forward to filming with Steph Curry. We are are supposed to film with him by the end of this year. We’ve been interacting with Lebron several times. We’d love to film a full video with him at some point. What’s crazy is we have gotten to the point where a lot of these athletes are reaching out to us wanting to film a video because it’s just fun for them and lets their fans and their sports audience see a different side of them that you never get to see. We did the one with the Dallas Stars. A lot of people they had never seen Jamie and Tyler with the helmets off so nobody really knew what their personalities were like. So it’s cool to be in a position where these athletes can reach out to us to film a video.”

The Dude Perfect crew works with the guests to come up with ideas. “They will basically reach out and say, ‘Hey we’re interested in filming the video; what do you guys think?’ And then we kind of put the main idea of the video together and then when we’re out there they always try a couple of things — ‘I think I could probably do this shot.’ It is kind of collaborative but it works out really well.”

They have developed an even greater appreciation for the skill, professionalism, and work ethic of the athletes they have met. “I remember specifically when we were filming with Ryan Tannehill, the quarterback with the Dolphins, we went down there to Dick’s Sporting Goods in Florida and we basically were there all that night filming. We were supposed to be there for a few hours and we ended up staying there longer than that but he was so accurate in making these shots that it didn’t take him long at all. I think he ended up making over 10 shots in the video just because it was so easy for him to make all these different shots that we were throwing at him, so it was really cool to film that version.”

I especially enjoyed the humor of the “Stereotypes” series of parodies of obnoxious behavior. It was clear that the Dudes are strategic as well as fun-loving.

“It was really big for us because we knew we wanted to diversify our content. First we were the basketball trick shot guys. And then it was guys that do the trick shots in general whether it’s football, basketball, hockey or whatever. Then it was a guys who worked with athletes, celebrities and friends to film these videos. Stereotypes was the first video series, it was kind of branching out. It was totally different than the trick shots and is actually more popular than trick shot videos I think for a couple reasons. It reaches an audience that is so much. The basketball stereotypes produced around 20 million views. We knew that we had to continue to do more of those videos and so that has been a theme for us moving forward. We’ll probably be adding two new video series to our line-up throughout the rest of this year. The stereotypes has been a huge part of our success and really kind of paved the way for how we are going to make content going forward.”

At the core of what they do is their faith. “We are all very fortunate to grow up in Christian homes and some really good families that while we were young made sure we were in church every Sunday and then once we got a little bit older encouraged us to really make that relationship with Jesus ours. We just feel like God has given us this platform not just to make money, not just to be famous and take a lot of pictures with people but to really influence a lot of people. And so it’s been really cool the conversations that we get to have with people who want to talk about our faith. It’s been pretty neat because for the most part it’s been really accepting I think the way we go about it helps too. I know Christians for the most part kind of get a bad rap but our main goal is just to love people in the way that God loves us and treat people the way that we want to be treated. It’s been really cool to see the response that we have gotten from that.”

You can follow Dude Perfect on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

McFarland USA

Posted on February 19, 2015 at 5:58 pm

B+

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG for thematic material, some violence and language
Profanity:	Some strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking
Violence/ Scariness:	Some gang-style violence, mostly off-screen, characters injured
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	February 20, 2015
Date Released to DVD:	June 1, 2015
Amazon.com ASIN:	B00UI5CUSM

In 1987, Coach Jim White (Kevin Costner), who had never coached or even run cross country, took a team of kids from one of the poorest communities in California to a state championship. Of course that would have to become a Disney movie. But in 2015, it is near-impossible to make a movie about a white coach and his all-Latino team without falling into one of two equally fatal traps. We are no longer in an era when it is acceptable to have a “mighty whitey” movie has a white savior teaching people of color a better way to live. We are also no longer in an era where it is acceptable to have a “magical Negro” plotline, with a person of color teaching a white person a better way to live. We all have people in our lives who teach us important lessons, but presenting these stories in a sensitive way is an almost insurmountable challenge.

“McFarland USA” comes as close as it can to surmounting that challenge by wisely — and honestly — showing what everyone in the story learns from the experience. That comes from warm, sensitive performances by all involved and by telling details. The best is after the team comes in last in their first meet because the coach failed to check out the terrain. The team had never practiced on an incline and the course of the raise included some steep passages. So, for their next practice, Coach White brings them to a place where he and the audience see enormous piles of something under tarps. White knows only that this is a good place to practice running uphill. The team knows what is under the tarps — millions of discarded almond shells, removed by field workers, so supermarkets across the country can stock shelled nuts in little plastic pouches. The symbolism, and White’s growing understanding not just of the challenges faced by his team but of their dedication, perseverance, and strength is un-sappy and touching.

It begins with White getting fired for an outburst at an arrogant high school football captain, and taking a job as an assistant football coach in the small farm town of McFarland in central California. The entire population is Latino and most of them work in the fields as “pickers,” starting at age 10. The kids and teenagers work before and after school. White is quickly relieved of his responsibilities as assistant coach when he takes a player out of the game because he has been injured. He decides to start a cross-country team, even though the principal tells him ‘That’s a private school sport. They breathe different air.” White has no experience. Also, because this is 1987, it would be about a decade before he could just Google how to do it. No one at the school has the time — or the shoes — for distance running. But he can see that they can run, and he gets them to agree to try to compete. At first, he does not even have a stopwatch to time their runs. He uses a kitchen timer.

It is a poor community. No one in the boys’ families has more than a 9th grade education. The high school is next door to the prison, with a barbed-wire fence. The families see sports as “not essential,” a distraction that keeps the boys away from paying work on the fields. “Every hour with you is food off my table,” says one father. But White and the community learn to trust each other, even after a scary encounter.

Director Niki Caro (“Whale Rider”) has a sensitive touch and a trust in her story and characters that gives them space to breathe. The running scenes are vivid and exciting. By the time we get to the end credit sequence, showing the team now in their 40’s and still running every day in McFarland, we see that more than the state championship has been won.

Parents should know that there are a few bad words, some drinking, and some gang-style violence. It is mostly off-screen, but characters are injured and there are brief disturbing images.

Family discussion: Which teachers have made you see that you were capable of more than you thought? How did White and the team demonstrate that to each other? When did the team start calling him “coach” and why?

If you like this, try: “Spare Parts,” “Chariots of Fire,” and “Hoosiers” and this interview with Carlos Pratts

Unbroken

Posted on December 24, 2014 at 5:49 pm

A-

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for war violence including intense sequences of brutality, and for brief language
Profanity:	Some strong and offensive/abusive language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Intense wartime peril and violence, characters injured, abused, and killed, some disturbing images, parent strikes a child with a belt
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	December 25, 2014
Date Released to DVD:	March 23, 2015
Amazon.com ASIN:	B00HLTDC9O

Oscar-winning actress Angelina Jolie breaks into the top ranks of American directors with “Unbroken,” showing an exceptional understanding not just of actors, but of tone, scale, and letting the camera tell the story. Working with the magnificent cinematography of Roger Deakins (“True Grit,” “Skyfall”), she adopts a classical style well-suited to the WWII setting, but every choice is careful, thoughtful, and powerful.

Based on the best-seller by Laura Hillenbrand, this is the story of Louis Zamperini, the son of Italian immigrants. He was a rebellious kid who became an Olympic athlete. His bomber plane crashed over the Pacific, and he survived for 47 days at sea, before being captured with one surviving crewmate, by the Japanese. In the prison camp, he was singled out for horrific abuse and repeatedly beaten.

The screenplay by the famously off-beat Joel and Ethan Coen is straightforward, direct, and sincere, keeping the focus on the war years, with the incidents from Zamperini’s past brought it primarily to show us how he relies on his memories to keep going. “Nobody’s chasing me,” he tells his brother who is urging him to run faster as he trains for a race. “I’m chasing you,” his brother tells him.

That internalized sense of mission helps him hold onto the idea of his own power as the brutal Japanese captors try to take everything away from him.

The opening scene puts us in the sky, and Jolie superbly evokes the thrill and the terror of flying on a bombing mission in aircraft that seem barely past the era of the Wright brothers. The crash scene is vertiginously disorienting. Jack O’Connell plays Zamperini with an effortless masculinity, understanding that it has nothing to do with macho posturing, just an imperishable sense of integrity, courage, and honor. O’Connell, Finn Witrock (“Noah”), and Domhnall Gleeson (“About Time”) perfectly capture the rhythms of an experienced crew, some amiable wisecracks and bravado to recognize the perilousness of their situation, but always focused, on task, and always, always, putting the team first.

We become so attached that it is sharply painful to see the characters experience such deprivation and abusive treatment. Japanese pop star Miyavi (real name Takamasa Ishihara) plays the sadistic Mutsushiro Watanabe, known as Bird. He knows of Zamperini’s celebrity as an athlete and sees that he is a symbol to the other prisoners.

If the Bird can break Zamperini, it will crush the morale of the whole camp. So, he singles Zamperini out for beatings and mind games. But Zamperini knows that “we beat them by making it to the end of the war alive.” He simply will not give up, and defining his own sense of what it means to win allows him to maintain a sense of control that is his most powerful weapon.

It is gorgeously filmed, superbly acted, and directed with great sensitivity and compassion, but the real impact of the film comes at the end, when we learn through a few simple titles, what happened to Zamperini after the war. Even Jolie recognizes that there is nothing she can put on screen to match the real-life footage of Zamperini, back in Japan at four days before his 81st birthday, running with the Olympic torch.

Parents should know that this movie includes very intense and disturbing wartime peril and violence, with a plane crash, an extended period lost at sea, and grueling prison camp abuse, and some strong language including racist epithets. School-age bullies harass and punch a character and a parent beats a child with a belt.

Family Discussion: What was the toughest challenge for Louis? Why didn’t he give up? Why did he forgive his captors?

If you like this, try: the book, Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption, and Zamperini’s own book, Don’t Give Up, Don’t Give In: Lessons from an Extraordinary Life, along with the films Stalag 17 and The Great Escape, also based on real-life WWII stories of American prisoners of war.

Exclusive Clip: When the Game Stands Tall

Posted on December 8, 2014 at 11:00 am

We are proud to be able to present this exclusive clip from the new DVD release “When the Game Stands Tall,” the extraordinary true story of the high school football team with the longest winning streak in the history of any sport, professional or amateur, and what happened after they lost a game. The DVD will be available on December 9, 2014.