Surfing
The North Shore winter of 1975 was a seminal point in surf culture and the doco is a must-see.
If you really want to feel in touch with the plumeria-stink of surfing history move that browser either towards youtube or some kinda buy-a-DVD-online store.
"Bustin Down the Door" is a 2008 documentary that takes you into the winter of 1974 when the Australians – led by the braggart Rabbit Bartholomew – and South Africans – with Shaun and Michael Tomson – arrived on the North Shore, won everything, and told the world about it in magazine stories and interviews.
The Hawaiians were furious! Such disrespect! Hadn't the Hawaiians shown the visitors much of that famous aloha? Why would these visitors respond with humiliation by media?
And so the following year, much violence and threats ensued. Rabbit lost his teeth when Hawaiians beat him unconscious in the water and on the beach at Sunset.
Shaun Tomson carried a shotgun in his car.
Ian Cairns got in a fight and was so enraged he almost threw his assailant into traffic on the Kam Highway.
The only surfer who avoided the trouble was Mark Richards, later to win the world title four times in a row, who had little truck with the braggadocio of his peers.
In the end, it was the famous Aikau family, including the legendary Eddie (this is three years before he died paddling into an open-ocean storm to rescue his pals) who brokered a deal between the Hawaiians as the Australians/South Africans.
This is a story about respect and about surifng's radical history. Watch, listen, and maybe you learn something.
The show is narrated by Ed Norton for added cred, if any was necessary.