This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

This is another one of *those* movies, you know the kind. The kind that starts out pretty decent (5.5 scraping the barrel territory, but still) and then out of nowhere gets into some forced religious message about someone finding God. (looking at you Cokeville Miracle)Stay away! Stay far away!PS Its not just that there is a religious message here. I've enjoyed several films with religious/spiritual themes before (Book of Eli) but its just so ridiculously hamfisted, shoe-horned and badly written here.PPS the films marketing deserves a special note, it doesn't make it clear at all that there is a religious message here. It seems like its deliberately set up to bring "unbeliefers" to the fold.

This is a bad movie, and I hate to say that, because people who made it probably liked it. But it's so bad. I feel like I lost an hour I will never get back :/ This is a movie about a young man, Ian played by Scott Eastwood, who is trying to find his place in the world. He is a surfer and wants to find his perfect wave to complete his life's wish. While on his pursuit he meets a girl and falls in love with her, but she just walks out on him after a misunderstanding, she is so important in one minute, and puff she's gone in the second. Also, unlike his mother he is not religious, but through a near death experience he realizes God is always with him.First of all, the acting and the dialogue are bad - everything is forced and actors are uptight.I just didn't like this movie. Every scene was forced, like they were all just reading from the script and not feeling anything. Child Ian was particularly bad at acting - that was hard to watch. Flashback scenes and retelling of the memories was unnecessary, I think we would have realized his mother has a connection with God without that, and we would have realized Ian has his differences with God. Also Ian's voice overs were not needed, I have a feeling they were just a filler in the movie, so there was no need for more bad dialogs.I feel like the story is on fast forward, everything is happening so fast, like they were trying to fit a lot of action in an hour, and the audio was to clear, we could hear everything even with waves crashing all around. The songs were to loud, and they took to much time, it was like watching a musical.It's just bad.

I read most of the reviews on The Perfect Wave ! I really thought the actors did a very decent job portraying their parts ! I'm a big fan of surfing movies ! I've surfed most of my life ! The places they surfed are some of the best in the world ! There seemed to be just the right amount of romance in this story ! It wasn't over the top surfing ! And that really fit in with the story ! It was written from a perspective that surprised me . And I don't think it should or even needed to be in the movie ! Religion has a place, but it definitely shouldn't have been in this film ! The movie was good enough to make me like it until he almost died ! At that point I almost turned it off ! It is worth watching though, but if the ridiculous Religion part was left out I would have scored it higher !

I can't remember having ever seen such a bad acted film. Ever! Wooden acting throughout by all, really all, actresses/actors. Awful music choice. Too loud and too bad.The no longer young man starts out to find his perfect wave. You don't know where from he actually starts out until they mention it way into the film. If I would have had that mother I would not have waited until I was 24 - I would have run away as soon as I could. Dear, she was either stupidly grinning or telling her story how she found Jesus, or crying or praying while crying and rolling on the floor. You sit there and watch and think what is that all about? I can understand a strong bond between mother and child, but that was so over-dramatic and inexplicable - it just left one wondering and hoping that they finish that scene soon.Is that film just a way to sell religion? The end was seriously the worst choice in a film full with bad choices from the beginning. Why do you have to get the man who inspired the movie to get his 3 min of preaching time? And write the name of his church in the screen credits, should I go and donate money for a sequel? Join the club, because I converted? Only watchable were the scenes with pure nature without any interruption by bad acting.And who on earth casted the very untalented son of Clint Eastwood? That man should go and find a profession that does not involve talking to an audience.This film proofs there is no god, she would never let us suffer that much.