Keep Surfing
A fascinating look at Munich's legendary river-surfing community, a group of six very different characters who all share a passion for going against the flow.
The story of an unlikely passion in a place that a large part of the world only knows as Oktoberfest City: Munich has become the home of a surfing crowd of urban individualists who pursue their dream by riding a river wave far from the ocean. "Keep Surfing" portrays six surfers of the Eisbach hardcore: Dieter, who was among the first to discover river surfing in the late 60s and still rides the waves every day with his two grown daughters. Walter, a working-class philosopher who now lives as a kind of lone wolf in Sardinia, where he rides his own wave every day. Golden boy Quirin, who has become a surf pro and global nomad – even though his heart still beats for Munich, where everything started. Among those who joined the local community is surf punk Eli Mack, for whom river surfing is a way back to the roots of surfing. And surf legends like Kelly Slater, Ross Clark Jones, and Taylor Knox have tried their luck on the Munich river wave.
- N.N.
Press Quotes
Programmkino.de
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“Keep Surfing” is a look at a sports subculture — one that's fascinating, frivolous or both — that should be an audience favorite.
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The river surfers of Munich, a politely bohemian bunch who drop in on the standing waves created when streams pass over rapids or through obstructed channels. It's an oddly stately endeavor: the practitioners more or less surf in place, facing upstream and doing 360s and cutbacks across the face of the oncoming but stationary wave."
New York Times
“A fast-paced and dynamic film, “Keep Surfing,” by Surfer and first time director Bjoern Richie Lob, gives new meaning to surfing by taking a back seat to the ocean and hitting the river…Breathtaking shots capture the surfers in action, performing hang-tens, laybacks and 180/360s with sublime style..”
REVIEW FIX
“Breathtaking”
Die Zeit
“The film has become a rousing, exciting, witty and, above all, emotional documentary, in which the viewer senses in every second the participants' love of surfing and, to a certain extent, of Munich too.”
DPA
“A grandiose film [...] With his low budget, the director has managed to make an impressive film that says more about the soul of surfing than many a multi-million-dollar production from America.”
FAZ
“Every festival has films that open one's eyes anew. Björn Richie Lob's documentary ‘Keep Surfing,' which was frenetically applauded at its premiere, is such a discovery.”
Süddeutsche Zeitung
