Birth of the Endless Summer Movie Poster
The acclaimed documentary traces Dick Metz’s adventures and the chance encounters that inspired Bruce Brown’s The Endless Summer
LOS ANGELES, CA, UNITED STATES, June 23, 2025 /
EINPresswire.com/ --
Birth of The Endless Summer, a feature documentary from director Richard Yelland and production company Curtis Birch, is now available worldwide on digital platforms. The Emmy-nominated film unearths a little-known origin story behind The Endless Summer, the seminal surf film from Bruce Brown Films that helped shape global surf culture and defined the California Dream.
The documentary follows surf pioneer Dick Metz on a steamship-hopping, train-jumping journey around the world from 1958 to 1961. While in Cape Town, South Africa, Metz met local surfer John Whitmore, a moment that changed the trajectory of surfing history and ultimately inspired filmmaker Bruce Brown to make The Endless Summer. On a tip from Whitmore, who would later become affectionately known as the “Oom,” or uncle, of South African surfing, Metz would also discover Cape St. Francis, later immortalized in Brown’s film as the “perfect wave.”
“If Dick hadn’t met Whitmore that day in 1959, The Endless Summer and the explosion of global surf culture that followed in its wake might never have happened,” said director Richard Yelland, “Dick Metz was a catalyst for the birth of modern surfing, and I wanted to make sure this history wasn't lost.”
Produced in association with Bruce Brown Films and made possible through a partnership with the Surfing Heritage and Culture Center, the world’s largest surf photo and film archive founded by Dick Metz, the film has earned numerous honors on the festival circuit and received a 2025 Los Angeles Area Emmy Award in the Independent Programming category. It is currently airing nationally on PBS, following its successful theatrical run in the U.S. and Australia. It is being distributed globally by Monkey Wrench Films and Garage Films, a division of Madman Entertainment.
The Birth of the Endless Summer is available worldwide on
Amazon,
Apple TV, Google Play, YouTube Movies, Fandango, and Vimeo on Demand.
About Curtis Birch
An Emmy
® nominated and Webby Award-winning creative production company founded in 2000, Curtis Birch tells stories that turn missions into movements. Curtis Birch has delivered paradigm-changing work for the likes of PBS, Outside TV, NIKE, HISTORY Channel, Toyota USA, Surfrider Foundation, and SAMBAZON, among others. The latest Curtis Birch production, Birth of The Endless Summer, was a 5x film festival winner and a 2025 Emmy Awards nominee, currently airing nationally on PBS.
About Monkey Wrench Films
As self-proclaimed industry disruptors, Monkey Wrench Films specializes in bringing well-deserved independent films to the big and small screen. Their current and recent feature film slate includes “Who Is Stan Smith?” from Lebron James’s Uninterrupted studio, the BAFTA Award-winning feature “The Hermit of Treig,” the much-anticipated follow-up to “The King of Kong,” called “Arcades and Love Songs,” “Geoff Marslett’s “Quantum Cowboys” starring Lily Gladstone and David Arquette, and Tom Putnam’s “The Dark Divide,” starring David Cross and Debra Messing. See their full release lineup at monkeywrenchfilms.com.
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Birth of the Endless Summer - Official Trailer