GIRLS CAN'T SURF
****
Director: Christopher Nelius
Screenplay: Christopher Nelius and Julie-Anne De Ruvo
Principal cast:
Pam Burridge
Jodie Cooper
Wendy Botha
Pauline Menczer
Lisa Andersen
Frieda Zamba
Layne Beachley
Country: Australia
Classification: M
Runtime: 108 mins.
Australian release date: 11 March 2021.
Christopher Nelius has directed and co-written, with editor Julie-Anne De Ruvo, the rousing new Australian documentary Girls Can’t Surf. The film comprehensively reveals how, in the early years of professional surfing, women who aspired to be pro surfers were mistreated and exploited when all they wanted was to be given the same opportunities as their male counterparts. This was a time when the ‘girls’ were expected to wear micro bikinis or high-cut one-pieces, peroxide their hair and stroke the boys’ egos. In the 1980s, a brave bunch of women began to stand up to this entrenched sexism and the documentary introduces us to most of them. It took many decades, but together they set the wheels of change in motion, slowly whittling away the attitudes of competition organisers, the surf media and sponsors. The culmination of their efforts, and the efforts of those who followed in their footsteps, was that women surfers were finally awarded equal prize-money with their male counterparts in 2019, a world first in professional sport.
The popularity of surfing exploded in various countries around the globe during the late 1950s and ‘60s. It was a purely male domain and females were only expected to be spectators, ready to hand towels to the boys. Few girls and women took up the challenge of heading out into the surf with the men and, if they did, they were either ignored or bullied. What the guys hadn’t reckoned with was that there were girls who were just as driven and competitive as they were. Once the sport went professional, enjoyed by huge crowds and embraced by sponsors, these young females wanted in but it soon became evident that the same sexist attitudes prevailed amongst the competition organisers. They were told that they could never be as good as the men and thus could only compete against other females, their heats would usually be scheduled when the surf was sloppy and the guys didn’t want to go out, and they would earn considerably less prize money. In short, they were treated like second-class citizens. All of these things combined to make it difficult to pay for airline tickets and accommodation when they had to travel to events in far-flung places like Australia, South Africa, South America, the Pacific, Europe and the USA. Often the women were billeted together in premises that were less than well-equipped, while their male counterparts stayed in five-star hotels. When they approached magazines like Surfer, Surfing and Tracks and competition organisers, they “would say ‘promote us, we will get you people into the sport’ but they didn’t believe in it,” says Jodie Cooper, who was on the pro tour from 1983 to 1993. “The only way you could get an article is once every two years when a magazine would go ‘it’s about time we dust off the old girls’ story’ and they’d do a story about the whole group.” “They were all such dumb-ass, chauvinistic pigs,” says fellow champion Wendy Botha.
Girls Can’t Surf tells this sorry history from the beginning via many candid, tightly-framed interviews with past champion surfers, like Cooper and Botha, Pam Burridge, Pauline Menczer, Frieda Zamba, Lisa Andersen, sisters Jolene and Jorja Smith, and Layne Beachley. These admirable women reminisce about the bad old days and acknowledge that the positive outcome of equal prize-money was a long time coming - but worth the indignities they had to put up with. Some battled personal crises, including diminishing self-confidence, drug and alcohol abuse and bouts of anorexia nervosa. None of this was revealed at the time because, frankly, these great surfers weren’t considered significant so the media just ignored them, whatever the issue. Botha explains that this is why she was happy to be involved with the documentary, saying, “It is important to tell our story so all the young surfer girls around the world have a greater appreciation of how far their sport has come and the sacrifices that were made by others along the way.”
You do not need to be a fan of surfing (although you might become one after seeing the terrific archival footage on display) or indeed know anything about it, to appreciate Girls Can’t Surf and to be caught up in it. These ground-breaking, glass ceiling-shattering women are inspiring. You’ll want to applaud as the credits roll. RESPECT!
Screenplay: Christopher Nelius and Julie-Anne De Ruvo
Principal cast:
Pam Burridge
Jodie Cooper
Wendy Botha
Pauline Menczer
Lisa Andersen
Frieda Zamba
Layne Beachley
Country: Australia
Classification: M
Runtime: 108 mins.
Australian release date: 11 March 2021.
Christopher Nelius has directed and co-written, with editor Julie-Anne De Ruvo, the rousing new Australian documentary Girls Can’t Surf. The film comprehensively reveals how, in the early years of professional surfing, women who aspired to be pro surfers were mistreated and exploited when all they wanted was to be given the same opportunities as their male counterparts. This was a time when the ‘girls’ were expected to wear micro bikinis or high-cut one-pieces, peroxide their hair and stroke the boys’ egos. In the 1980s, a brave bunch of women began to stand up to this entrenched sexism and the documentary introduces us to most of them. It took many decades, but together they set the wheels of change in motion, slowly whittling away the attitudes of competition organisers, the surf media and sponsors. The culmination of their efforts, and the efforts of those who followed in their footsteps, was that women surfers were finally awarded equal prize-money with their male counterparts in 2019, a world first in professional sport.
The popularity of surfing exploded in various countries around the globe during the late 1950s and ‘60s. It was a purely male domain and females were only expected to be spectators, ready to hand towels to the boys. Few girls and women took up the challenge of heading out into the surf with the men and, if they did, they were either ignored or bullied. What the guys hadn’t reckoned with was that there were girls who were just as driven and competitive as they were. Once the sport went professional, enjoyed by huge crowds and embraced by sponsors, these young females wanted in but it soon became evident that the same sexist attitudes prevailed amongst the competition organisers. They were told that they could never be as good as the men and thus could only compete against other females, their heats would usually be scheduled when the surf was sloppy and the guys didn’t want to go out, and they would earn considerably less prize money. In short, they were treated like second-class citizens. All of these things combined to make it difficult to pay for airline tickets and accommodation when they had to travel to events in far-flung places like Australia, South Africa, South America, the Pacific, Europe and the USA. Often the women were billeted together in premises that were less than well-equipped, while their male counterparts stayed in five-star hotels. When they approached magazines like Surfer, Surfing and Tracks and competition organisers, they “would say ‘promote us, we will get you people into the sport’ but they didn’t believe in it,” says Jodie Cooper, who was on the pro tour from 1983 to 1993. “The only way you could get an article is once every two years when a magazine would go ‘it’s about time we dust off the old girls’ story’ and they’d do a story about the whole group.” “They were all such dumb-ass, chauvinistic pigs,” says fellow champion Wendy Botha.
Girls Can’t Surf tells this sorry history from the beginning via many candid, tightly-framed interviews with past champion surfers, like Cooper and Botha, Pam Burridge, Pauline Menczer, Frieda Zamba, Lisa Andersen, sisters Jolene and Jorja Smith, and Layne Beachley. These admirable women reminisce about the bad old days and acknowledge that the positive outcome of equal prize-money was a long time coming - but worth the indignities they had to put up with. Some battled personal crises, including diminishing self-confidence, drug and alcohol abuse and bouts of anorexia nervosa. None of this was revealed at the time because, frankly, these great surfers weren’t considered significant so the media just ignored them, whatever the issue. Botha explains that this is why she was happy to be involved with the documentary, saying, “It is important to tell our story so all the young surfer girls around the world have a greater appreciation of how far their sport has come and the sacrifices that were made by others along the way.”
You do not need to be a fan of surfing (although you might become one after seeing the terrific archival footage on display) or indeed know anything about it, to appreciate Girls Can’t Surf and to be caught up in it. These ground-breaking, glass ceiling-shattering women are inspiring. You’ll want to applaud as the credits roll. RESPECT!