Surfwise: The Amazing True Odyssey of the Paskowitz Family
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Actor: Andy Irons, Chris Owens, Rabbit Kekai, Sonia Darrin, Sunny GarciaBrand: SURFWISE: THE AMAZING PASKOWITZ FAMILY (DVD M
Cinematographer: Dave Homcy
Cinematographer: Nate Bressler
Composer: John Dragonetti
Audio: English (Original Language); Spanish (Subtitled)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.78:1
Running Time: 93 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2008-07-29
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Magnolia
DVD Reviews of Surfwise: The Amazing True Odyssey of the Paskowitz Family
DVD Review: Don't miss this!
Summary: 5 Stars
not your ordinary family, but that's why it's so entertaining. Surfing was and still is shaped by this family.DVD Review: Awsome documentry
Summary: 5 Stars
This is probably the best documentary I've ever seen. Their story is fascinating, but be advised that there is frank a very graphic language not suitable for younger viewers.DVD Review: Freedom for Myself; Prison for My Children
Summary: 5 Stars
The charismatic doctor and surfing champion Dorian Paskowitz languishes through 2 failed marriages during the conventional 1950s before having his epiphany in which he will be a "free spirit" and travel with his third wife and 9 children like a band of surfing vagabonds. The new lifestyle is great for the father who finds sensual and spiritual fulfillment; sadly, though, it's a prison for his children who must live without schooling, money for clothes, and the normal opportunity to meet kids their age.
This documentary does an excellent job of showing how these children navigate precariously through their one life as celebrities of counterculture and their second life of social dysfunction and resentment toward a father who wanted unlimited freedom for himself and draconian imprisonment for his children.
DVD Review: Proof that you don't need an SUV, a McMansion and a 401K to be happy...
Summary: 5 Stars
This movie should change your outlook. If it doesn't, perhaps you need to re-evaluate your priorities. Money does not buy happiness.DVD Review: Making Waves with an Unconventional Lifestyle
Summary: 5 Stars
SURFWISE is a fascinating documentary chronicling the unconventional lifestyle of "Doc" Poskowitz and his family. The latter includes spouse and some nine kids, who live a bohemian, itinerant, surf-centric lifestyle in a 24-foot camper van. No school for these kids! Nevertheless, they lived a somewhat regimented existence, one envied by kids who were more wealthy in material things.
All of the kids grew up with various "baggage" due to the unorthodox upbringing, and the father is a rather magnetic, charismatic character.
The cinematography here is great - you feel you are out in the ocean, in the surf, and can see how this aspect of nature would be seductive. SURFWISE raises questions about the tradeoffs involved in turning your back on the conventional path that society beckons you to follow - the good and bad features, the frayed nature of family ties, the family love that can (at least temporarily) transcend differences and childhood trauma.
Whether you endorse or abhor the lifestyle depicted in this documentary, SURFWISE is an excellent movie!
Description of Surfwise: The Amazing True Odyssey of the Paskowitz Family
Like many American outsider-adventurers Dorian Doc Paskowitz set out to realize a utopian dream. Abandoning a successful medical practice he sought self-fulfillment by taking up the nomadic life of a surfer. But unlike other American searchers like Thoreau or Kerouac Paskowitz took his wife and nine children along for the ride all eleven of them living in a 24 foot camper. Together they lived a life that would be unfathomable to most but enviable to anyone who ever relinquished their dreams to a straight job. The Paskowitz Family proved that America may be running out of frontiers but it hasn t run out of frontiersman.System Requirements:Running Time: 93 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre:?DOCUMENTARIES/BIOGRAPHY Rating:?R UPC:?876964000932 Manufacturer No:?10093American history is filled with legendary characters who turned their backs on society, snubbing its conventions and opting for a simple, contemplative life. Like Thoreau. Kerouac. And.. Paskowitz? Well, actually, yeah. Surfwise, director Doug Pray's 2007 documentary, tells the decidedly offbeat tale of Dorian "Doc" Paskowitz. Now in his mid-80s, the guy who calls himself "one of the few dumb Jewish doctors" was once on a big-time career track; a Stanford-educated physician, he was the head of the American Medical Association in Hawaii, an expert surfer, and a strong, handsome man who often donated his services and was asked to consider a run for governor of that state. But more than 50 years ago, Paskowitz and his third wife, Juliette (his previous marriages had failed due to his own "sexual ignorance"), essentially chucked it all for the sake of family, surfing, and precious little else. They had nine children, all but one of them boys, and the entire brood lived in a 24-foot camper, traveling constantly. Money? There was precious little of that (although years later the family generated some income by establishing a popular surf camp near San Diego). Food? They managed, with Paskowitz enforcing a strict organic regimen. School? "Education be damned," Doc said, and not one of the children ever attended classes regularly. To outsiders, it was an idyllic life; "we were not attached to the physical world at all," says one of the (now middle-aged) kids today. But the downside was deep. Crammed into their tiny space, the children watched and listened as their parents noisily made love every single night (not a great thing for the kids' own later sex lives). Driven--and sometimes abused--by their ultra-controlling, narcissistic dad, they became excellent surfers but were ill-prepared for adult life when finally, in their 20s, some of them began to leave "home." Remarkably, they all seem relatively (so to speak) fine now, with real jobs in surfing, music, and the film business and a fairly clear perspective on their strange upbringing ("Don't do anything a gorilla wouldn't do" was one of Doc's mantras). Extras include outtakes, commentary, surfing footage, and more. --Sam Graham
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