The Wavescape Surf and Ocean Festival once again presents a lineup of top local and overseas films at the 2025 iteration of the Durban International Film Festival. Wavescape showcases a curated selection of six feature films and shorts, screening at Suncoast CineCentre on Saturday, 19 July and Sunday, 20 July.
Wavescape Director Steve Pike, aka Spike, says that the films set for DIFF are an exciting blend of films with a strong emphasis on Africa. “We’re blessed with some of the best filmmakers in Africa, which contains some of the most beautiful coast and ocean in the world. The theme of exploration and travel is woven through the films we are bringing to Durban,” says Spike.
All six films are set in Africa, representing among others, Mozambique, Angola, Morocco, Namibia, Reunion Island and many places in South Africa, including Wild Coast, Cape Town, the Eastern Cape, and the incredible surfing you find in KwaZulu-Natal.
Spike said that the rhythm and poetry of the ocean and surfing films were a visceral celebration of the natural world, and the spiritual solace and physical enrichment that the ocean brings to human beings.
Three feature films – The Source, Where We Thrive and Le Jardin: The Secret of Safi – will come to Durban this year. The Source has been called one of the best travelogues and self-discovery movies in its genre. Utilising incredible cinematography and music, it depicts pro surfer Koa Smith’s trip from Hawaii to South Africa. He is an ‘influencer’ approaching burnout, but the wonderful sights, sounds and people of South Africa help him slow down to feel connection with nature and the soul of our land and oceans.
In Where We Thrive, from the opening line “holy macaroni cheese balls!” to the closing credits of this tribute to the significant role in surf culture played by Kommetjie, near Cape Town, which almost rivals that played by Durban. This sumptuously filmed adventure documentary, narrated by endurance runner Ryan Sandes, is a non-pretentious unearthing of a small-town gem.
The beautifully shot Le Jardin: The Secret of Safi is filmed in Morocco. It is part travelogue, part adventure and historical documentary that tells the story of a mythical surf break called Safi, discovered by surfers in the early 1980s. They swore to secrecy and surfed it alone for decades – but a secret this good is hard to keep.
The three shorter films screening at Suncoast CineCentre are Kelp Town, Changing Tempo and Surfing the Island of Sharks. In Kelp Town, professional South African surfer Adin Masencamp takes us into the thick kelp beds in the deep ocean off Cape Town. Swells from distant storms explode like bombs on the rock reef. You must dodge abalone poachers and the occasional shark, not to mention the scary wave in freezing cold water.
The beautifully shot mini biopic Changing Tempo will appeal to surfers and non-surfers as it follows exceptionally talented Cape Town surfer Mikey February around Africa after he left the professional world tour. Carefully curated vignettes are a sumptuous depiction of Mikey’s virtuosity as he heads to the Wild Coast, Cape Town, KwaZulu-Natal, Mozambique and Angola.
Reunion Island is an ocean paradise but, after several fatal shark attacks over the years, surfing all but ceased, except at the small enclave of La Jetée. Surfing the Island of Sharks is a journey to connect with this incredible island and her people. Shark attacks are a concern, and surfing outside designated areas is illegal, but there have been no attacks on the island in several years.
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