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John John Florence Headlines Laguna Beach's Coast Film Festival

Originally posted on SURFER | By Jake Howard | Last updated Nov 5, 2024 5:07 PM ET

The first legit skateboard I owned was a Rob Roskopp model from Santa Cruz Skateboards. Let's call it 1986 because it was the second or third iteration of the evolving graphic. Unbeknownst to my pre-teen brain at the time, both the Roskopp art and the Santa Cruz logo were the creations of artist Jim Phillips. And for those students of early SURFER Magazine history, you know that Phillips got his start doing illustrations for John Severson's SURFER Quarterly in the early '60s.

"Living in Santa Cruz has been a big contribution to my art because I lived near the beach from being a little kid," described Phillips in an old interview. "I was into surfing, which brought in skateboarding, and so it's been part of the lifestyle that I've lived here."

And now, 40 years since Phillips released his first Roskopp graphic, and more than 60 since submitting his first sketches to SURFER, his full story is being shared at the Coast Film Festival in Laguna Beach in the film "Art and Life: The Story of Jim Phillips."

Kicking off on November 9, the film festival and all its accompanying happenings run for a full nine days. Phillips story of success, struggle and revival is one of a number of inspiring films that will be screened. At the top of the marquee is "Hear and There," the newest Florence brothers joint. Capturing John, Nathan and Ivan Florence doing their thing during the winter of 2023/24, it's the kind of film that makes you want to surf more and "makes the statement: surf films are not dead."

And while the Florence and Phillips films would be enough to leave me with a big, ol' smile on my face, this year's Coast lineup is really something special that incapsulates the magic of the pursuit. "Water Brother," the story of East Coast legend Sid Abbruzzi is on the bill. "Let It Kill You: The Arto Saari Story" details the surf and skate journey of iconic European skater Arto Saari. Landing on Oahu, he found surfing, started shooting surf photos, and in the process reinvented himself. And on a similar skateboard tip is "Against The Current," a short film that trains its lens on the artistic process of the the great Stacy Peralta.

Academy Award winner Matthew McConaughey makes an appearance at Coast in the form of the narrator for MacGillivray Freeman Film's "Superhuman Body: World of Medical Marvels," which delves in the miracle that is the confluence of the human body and medical science. Greg MacGillivray, who's credited with pioneering IMAX technology, started his career as a surf filmmaker and now sits on the board of directors at the Surfing Heritage and Culture Center.

In "Beyond Normal," surfer Becca Speak claws her way back into the water after suffering a traumatic brain injury. Taylor Knox's story of overcoming a spinal injury when he was 15 is told in full in "The Body Follows the Mind." And Norway’s Varanger Fjord is exposed in the surf adventure log "NØ WAY." There are more films, including a slew of bangers from the snow, ski and mountain bike worlds, but you get the idea, the Coast Film Festival is stacked ... which is why it now runs over two full weekends.

On Saturday, November 9, the Coast Summit, an event dedicated to conversations around the environment and sustainability, sees Chilean big-wave hero Ramon Navarro, Chad Nelson, the CEO of Surfrider Foundation, and surf explorer turned filmmaker Keith Malloy sit for a discussion called "Finding Common Ground on Marine Protected Areas." Bruce Moore, the Director of Innovation and Sustainability at Florence, will be taking part in a conversation about the myriad of uses folks are finding for seaweed. In total, there are seven different sustainability-related subjects being drilled into.

The Coast Film Festival runs from November 9-17, 2024. The films, the conversations, the live music (which we didn't even get to here), and most importantly, the community, make the festival much more than just a chance to watch a surf or ski movie. It's an opportunity to come together, share together, laugh together, and celebrate together. We're lucky to chase the sun and live the lives we do, and it's that spirit that makes Coast so special.

This article first appeared on SURFER and was syndicated with permission.

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