Summary: Hot Buttered Soul was a revolutionary four track LP released by Isaac Hayes and the Bar-Kays in 1969. A few months later, 20-ear-old Terry Fitzgerald, fresh from a Hawaiian winter season and a big fan of funk and soul rhythms, decided to borrow the name for his surfboard company. But all three words didn't quite fit on the rainbow sash logo. Thus Hot Buttered Surfboards were born -and with it one of surfing's true originals. But the third word never went missing. Instead it's lived in the handmade, hand-painted HB surfboards and the styles that arose from riding them, over three decades, in the best surf on the planet. Hot Buttered Soul: The Movie draws on a deep well of surf cinema heritage to present the surfing of the HB extended family. Choice selections from HB's "Sultans of Speed" series, along with surf flick classics Morning of the Earth, A Winter's Tale, Fantasea, Storm Riders and more, are expertly intercut by editor Mick Waters, with interviews and commentary from Andrew Kidman and Derek Hynd. Wherever they went, "Sultans" trips always had the knack of scoring amazing waves. Viewers will be stunned by the NSW north coast sessions of '88, when in an outrageous 10 day binge, Poto, Simon Law, Cattle and Deaney surfed all the classic pointbreaks at their maximum size and shape. They'll also freak at Joel's hair-raising couple of bombs at a terrifying Irish reefbreak, and wallow in the pleasure of perfect Periscope Point on Sumbawa, Indonesia, before the surf camps arrived. Then the movie swings to a down home sequence that sees Terry, Kye and Joel head back to Jeffreys Bay on a family trip with some timeless TF equipment, including Driftas and wing pin single fins, and ride 'em into the ground at J-Bay and the rarely glimpsed Cape St Francis. Yet underlying at all is the still-astonishingly fresh lines and torquing style of TF in the 1970s, blowing away the world at Jeffreys, Rocky Point, Uluwatu and various lesser known locations. It's a sublime treat watching today's power surfing at its moment of invention. The unique soundtrack, featuring ex Tamam Shud guitarist Tim Gaze in front of a six piece band, was written, practiced, and finally recorded as a single 59-inute free-flowing piece, in sync with the movie's final cut. It's an inspired enhancement to inspired footage. -ick Carroll
