Serving up an all star cast of Brazil’s hottest talents from Filipe Toledo to Caio Ibelli, Sorria from Director Gabriel Novis, takes performance surfing to the next level. Combining incredible cinematography, killer sound track and dream like waves in Mexico, Indo, California and Hawaii, this is the performance film of 2016 that everyone is talking about. We caught up with Gabriel to find out what all the fuss is about.
London Surf Film Festival hosts the European Premiere of Sorria Thursday 22nd September. For tickets and info, hit the link: http://londonsurffilmfestival.com/sorria/
What is the concept behind ‘Sorria’ ?
Sorria means smile in Portuguese and the movie is a crazy attempt to inspire people and let them know that they should always smile no matter what and enjoy life because everything happens really fast. So don’t take yourself so seriously…kinda cheesy, but whatever! I wrote some stuff in the film with Cornelia Grimsmo [Norwegian model/actress] and we tried to explain that idea of smiling in a different way.
Were there specific people you wanted to work with?
I picked surfers that I thought would be a good fit for the project. They had to match the film’s vibe and be available and down to shoot. I chose guys that have the ”sorria” spirit and that are good friends with me.
I wanted to represent a little bit of our culture in this film and that’s why I only picked Brazilian surfers.
I wanted to show that surfing in Brazil isn’t all about competition. That even though a lot of these guys compete, they freesurf as much as anyone else. I also wanted to express how Brazilians think and feel, and kind of explain why we are so noisy and take so much space. It’s because we are happy, and we grow up learning that we should always go through everything showing our teeth. It’s like that in Brazil, it doesn’t matter if you have a lot or if you have nothing, we’ve always gotta keep smiling. That’s the spirit of this project.
Who inspires you?
My dad used to collect surf films so I have watched pretty much everything out there. When I was young my favorite films were the Volcom and the …Lost ones like: 156 Tricks by Ozzie Wright, Creepy Fingers, The Decline and Taylor Steele’s films (Campaign, etc.) Now I’ve been watching a lot of Kai Neville’s stuff but Joe G. is the man. Strange Rumblings in Shangri-la is my favorite surf film right now. Outside of surfing I love all of Wes Anderson’s films, but I am also really interested in watching everything Tim Burton and Alejandro González Iñárritu create. My favorite film of all time, though, is probably Apocalypse Now.
You got to travel a lot for the film…
We did travel to a few secret spots in Indonesia, Mexico, Hawaii and all over California for a period of one year. My favourite trip was to Mexico because, for some reason, all of us (surfers and crew) were so connected. The vibe was awesome and we scored perfect empty waves. I could really feel the vibe of ” sorria ” and get excited about this movie.
How was the filmmaking process – the highs and the lows?
My favourite part was going on the trips and also editing because that’s when you see all the possibilities and what can be done with the material you shot. The pre production wasn’t fun at all because I did and still do struggle with finding money for making my projects come alive ( lol ).The hardest part was finding dates that would match the surfers dates because those guys never stop. We would have to plan for months to finally be able to go on a trip together.
What’s next for Gabriel Novis?
There is a lot going on but I really want to keep the ” sorria ” vibe alive. I think this has such an important message and we cannot stop talking about it. I wanna do ”sorria de novo ” which means: smile again. It would be like the part 2 of the movie but this time we wanna go bigger and better and look for this missing smile in some pretty cool places. Travel to cold destinations and focus on the cinematography… Is there anyone reading this interested on helping me out finding money to get this project together? Haha
London Surf / Film Festival X Reef 22 September – 1 October brings to the UK the best surf films from around the globe. Accompanied by talks with waveriding’s most inspiring heroes and icons, a live audio visual performance, a very special 35mm screening, a gallery show, music, art and more this saline hit of inspiration is an essential cultural happening. For full schedule details and info on a couple of very special LS/FF pop-up screenings head to: www.londonsurffilmfestival.com
