Freakside

All the way from Jamie O’Brien’s back yard, Pipeline, to the sandy shores and barreling reefs of Bali, Freakside is definitely an all out and action packed thrill ride that will leave you positively energized, motivated and ready to surf. Freakside is jam packed from beginning to end with Jamie and his friends pulling into seemingly endless double overhead barrels, throwing huge airs, stylish floaters, spins, snaps, and even shows some of Jamie’s tow-ins. With a heavy and fast paced, yet seamless and melodic composition, this film continually draws you further and further in with every moment it’s on screen, allowing you to experience these unfolding events seemingly first hand.
Filmed throughout the world over the past year, the renowned surf cinematographer Tim Reardon has followed Jamie to all his favorite surf spots and captured some truly incredible footage of Jamie’s world-class surfing talent. From these inspiring clips we learn just how far Jamie can actually step things up, push the envelope, boarder his own physical limitations, as well as defy the restrictions of sheer gravity its self. The overall quality of the film footage is great; encompassing ariel cliff shots, unique water angles, and the use of jet skies allows for progressive follow along shots that keep you in the front row.
The film is a great line up of surfers and a soundtrack that will keep your feet tapping ‘till the very end. Some of the surfers in this film include likes of Josh Kerr, Wayan “Betet” Merta, Kawika Stillwell, Bernado Bigmue, John Philbin, Kalani Chapman, Jason Frederico, and Dede Suryana. All of whom showcase their individual talents and triumphs to the sounds of Sizzle Tree, Dirty Heads, Sashomom, Tha Dogg Pound, Much The Same, Over It, and Jack Johnson, which creates a mix of moments that are both extremely energized along with points that are very relaxed and mellow-melodic.
Despite a last minute disaster that caused Jamie’s computer hard drive to seize up and fail, inevitably loosing all of the footage he had been editing for months on end, not a piece of the actual film shows anything notably missing, disorganized or otherwise different from what you would have expected to find other than the lack of special features on the DVD itself. All of the special features are actually located online, at Jamie O’Brien’s website.
Freakside shows us that there are still no limitations on what one can do on a surfboard. With good music, excellent cinematography, smooth editing techniques, incredible surf action from Jamie O’Brien and friends, this film is sure to put a smile on your face, a thump in your heart, a vibrating energy in your body and a board under your arm as you head to the beach.