Surfers take spotlight at Newport Beach Film Festival

Mike Cianciulli has surfed for a quarter-century, and he’s braved the roaring, cavernous waves that roll into the Pipeline reef break on Oahu’s North Shore.

In other words, he can empathize with his film’s cast and crew.

Cianciulli, an event producer with the Huntington Beach-based media company Surfline, co-directed “Pipeline and Kelly Slater: Oakley Wave of the Winter Documentary,” which will screen Sunday at the Newport Beach Film Festival. The half-hour film depicts the annual Oakley Wave of the Winter contest, in which surfers and videographers compete for the sports equivalent of Best Actor and Best Director.

During the winter months in Oahu, any surfer can attempt to catch a formidable wave — and anyone with a camera can shoot footage of the ride. At the competition’s end, the judges award $25,000 to the best surfer and $5,000 to the best videographer. And with so many hopefuls competing, that gave Cianciulli and his team plenty of footage to choose from.

“It’s obviously some of the best waves in the world,” said Cianciulli, who produces Wave of the Winter for Surfline and co-directed “Pipeline and Kelly Slater” with Marc Beaty. “So the performance levels there just go through the roof.”

As “Pipeline and Kelly Slater” makes clear, capturing those performances on film requires more than a little artistry. Some of the shots are so intricate, tracking surfers close up inside the barrel of a wave, that a viewer might guess that computer animation had been involved.

According to Dave Gilovich, the executive vice president of Surfline, that wasn’t the case. To score those pristine shots, photographers use tools that range from tripods to GoPros, and many of them have at least some experience with surfing themselves.

“If you get a good day at Pipeline, there might be 12 people shooting from the beach and another three or four shooting from the water,” Gilovich said. “The surfers are the talent, and when they get a good ride, most anybody is going to send it in.”

“Pipeline and Kelly Slater” will screen as part of a surfing double bill Sunday at the Triangle Square Cinemas in Costa Mesa. Accompanying it will be the feature-length “Ion the Barrel Vol. 2,” which spotlights a group of surfers — including Slater, Jamie O’Brien, Jamie Mitchell, Reef McIntosh and Laird Hamilton — on a global excursion.

The program will be a spotlight in particular for Slater, who won the 2013-14 Wave of the Winter competition shown in Cianciulli and Beaty’s film. At the end of the documentary, he’s shown netting two prizes: $25,000 for the best wave, plus $10,000 for the Clif Bar Overall Performance Award.

Slater was not available for comment, but Cianciulli had a hunch what the often-decorated surfer might spend the prize money on.

“Probably plane tickets around the world,” he said with a chuckle, “because that’s what that guy does.”

If You Go

What: “Pipeline and Kelly Slater: Oakley Wave Of The Winter Documentary” and “Ion the Barrel Vol. 2”

Where: Triangle Square Cinemas, 1870 Harbor Blvd., Costa Mesa

When: 5 p.m. Sunday

Cost: $14

Information: (949) 253-2880 or https://www.newportbeachfilmfest.com