A good surf movie you’ll watch a dozen times, a mediocre movie is as useful as a five dollar power tool.

Out here in viewer land we are swimming in surf imagery. The web delivers clips every 2.5 seconds, surf mags cover mount a free(ish) DVD every second month and surf companies bombard you with adversurfing everywhere you look. All this competition has put the squeeze on traditional surf movie producers. They need Hollywood budgets, star power, perfect waves, quirky angles, fresh ideas, killer soundtracks and the Dane factor. Craftsmanship doesn’t cut it. Artistry is required. Why else would anyone actually pay for their product?

The rub is a familiar one for modern consumers. A good surf movie you’ll watch a dozen or more times, a mediocre movie is as useful as a five dollar power tool. You want quality from a market that is smothering you in cheap mass-produced quantity. With summer flat spells already bearing down and the silly season approaching Tracks offer these suggestions for premium visual stimulus.

1. Who is J.O.B.? I didn’t think I could sit through another movie on Jamie O’Brien either. But this thing is startlingly good. It includes some of the best tube riding you’ll ever see at Deserts, Nias, Pipeline, P-Pass, Mexico and Cloudbreak. Jamie deservedly won the Surfer Poll’s “best performance” and “heavy water” awards for the film. It took three years to make and, besides the incredible surfing, you get a refreshingly honest insight into the subject. The bio doesn’t pull any punches about J.O.B. being arrogant, cocky or a bit of a dick – but somehow you end up gunning for him. Buy it for: Anyone who hates, loves, hasn’t heard of, or is steadfastly indifferent to Jamie O’Brien.

2. Melali While The Drifter worked well as a travel/Rob Machado doco it was distinctly light in one crucial area: surfing. Here we have a collection of all the clips that didn’t make the film, but perhaps should have. Filmed over a year throughout Indonesia and starring his smoothness and a cast of his uber buddies  (Kelly, Dane, Dorian, Kalani, Malloy, Tanjung) it is the perfect film to get you amped for next year’s Indo trip. The soundtrack is low and lazy and will sooth the burs of a summer hangover. Buy it for: anyone who’s ever been to Indonesia or is planning on going to Indonesia or is in fact Indonesian.

3. Castles in the Sky. The second instalment in Taylor Steele’s travel trilogy is an improvement on the first – Sipping Jetstreams – which was flawed by a surplus of arty travel footage. There’s more surfing in Castles but we still get and appreciate the emphasis on travel and how this surfing gig is about more than riding waves (if you want it to be). The opening sequences in Iceland are stunning and if you’ve ever dreamt of surfing in a winter wonderland you could do worse than stick this in your own chrissy stocking. Buy it for: anyone with a well-worn passport, an out of date passport or no passport.

4. Innersection. There are countless ways to ride a wave and we see a stack of them in this hi fi collection. I like the Ozzie Wright, Craig Ando, Kelly Slater, and Corey Lopez sections myself but why is my opinion any more valid than yours? It’s not which is the whole idea behind Innersection. The online community chose the 20 guys who appear in the film and now the owners of this movie choose who gets the 100K for having the best section in it. Democracy at work. Buy it for: The Children of the Revolution or their out of step step-dads.

NOTE: All DVDs availble online from VAS entertainment HERE