Nicolas Cage stars in The Surfer, but it isn’t until the final moments that he actually mounts a surfboard. Set against the backdrop of an Australian muscle beach, the film isn’t truly about surfing. Instead, it explores themes of male anxiety, power struggles, midlife crises, and the rituals of pain and dominance that define masculinity. Premiering at a Cannes midnight show, The Surfer embodies the trippy, slapdash comic nightmare that thrives in late-night slots, demanding audiences to sit back and simply “go with it.”
Cage facilitates this journey effortlessly. The film, a psychodrama dipped in high-camp and bad-trip aesthetics, allows Cage to unleash a frenetic performance. However, Lorcan Finnegan’s direction and Thomas Martin’s writing lack the filmmaking finesse to fully complement its surreal, what-is-reality? tone, leaving the film feeling sketchy and incomplete.
The Surfer is one of those twisty-headed puzzle movies where the titular character is simply known as…The Surfer. Initially, Cage portrays him as an ordinary, desperate finance guy with a disheveled beard and rumpled suit. Arriving at Luna Bay in his Lexus with his teenage son (Finn Little), he aims to bond over surfing while dreaming of reuniting with his estranged wife. His ultimate goal is to purchase his childhood beach house, hoping that reclaiming this piece of his past will restore his fractured life.
From the outset, this backward-glancing fantasy signals that Cage’s character is stuck in a pathetic dream world. As the film progresses, his neurotic nostalgia unravels into an actual dreamscape. In this comedy of masochism, where everything seems cosmically designed to go wrong, Cage’s every attempt at normalcy is thwarted by a conspiracy-like network of Aussie macho terror.
Cage’s character is outbid on the house, and the local surfer “bay boys” refuse to let him surf, enforcing a strict “locals only” rule. The local cop (Justin Rosniak) mocks him instead of helping, and he faces continuous humiliation, from losing his surfboard to being treated like a deadbeat. As his grip on reality slips, Cage sinks deeper into disarray, encountering a cranky bum (Nicholas Cassim) who might be a reflection of himself.
Cage delivers a medium-grade field day of dishevelment, degradation, and distorted anger, seething and grimacing through each setback. His encounters with gross water from a beach bathroom faucet, a dead rat used as a weapon, and surreal moments like eating raw eggs enhance the film’s stoned, hallucinatory atmosphere.
The Surfer ultimately serves as an allegory for new money and retro masculinity’s tribal rites. The public beach, walled off by trust-fund kids, symbolizes Cage’s looming loss of family, home, and his sense of manhood. The lead bay boy, Scally (Julian McMahon), heads a local men’s cult with the mantra, “You can’t surf if you don’t suffer,” forcing Cage’s character to hit rock bottom to achieve a twisted form of redemption.
Despite its ambitious themes, The Surfer is amusing yet suffers from an overly broad and cursory execution, limiting its real-world appeal. Cage’s artful overacting is taken seriously enough to enjoy but not so seriously that it becomes merely a midnight curiosity.
Accustomed to seeing Cage in over-the-top revenge roles, his name now brings legitimacy to any project. In The Surfer, he plays a businessman let’s call him the Surfer on the verge of a breakdown, trying to reclaim his childhood home and reconnect with his family. Instead of a revenge plot, he’s trapped in a nightmare of sun-bleached lunacy, embarrassment, and humiliation.
Cage, an actor known for enduring on-screen punishment, faces one of his most grueling roles yet. His character is a nameless businessman on the edge, facing a divorce, losing his son’s respect, and showing up to work disheveled. In a desperate attempt to turn his life around, he plans a surf trip with his son, only to be thwarted by alpha-male surfers enforcing their local-only rule. The ringleader, Scally, is a guru running his group like a mafia-cum-seminar-cum-frat house, with a compromised local cop and a mysterious hobo hinting at darker secrets.
As the deal to buy his house falls through, the Surfer is stripped of everything his shoes, jacket, phone, car, and dignity. His refusal to leave despite escalating humiliations becomes maddeningly admirable and finally heroic. “You have to suffer before you surf,” Scally tells his disciples, and suffer the Surfer does.
The universe Finnegan creates is one of cruel absurdity, where everyone seems to conspire against the Surfer. Cage’s hysterical performance captures his character’s descent into madness, delivering moments ripe for gif-dom and memorable lines like “Eat the rat.” However, the film’s length feels unnecessarily grueling, with a denouement that fails to deliver the expected big splash.
The Surfer is a gritty, surreal exploration of a man’s struggle against societal and personal demons, anchored by Cage’s unrestrained performance. While its execution might be too broad for some, its ambition and Cage’s dedication make it a notable entry in his filmography and a compelling midnight movie experience.