The new surf bio-pic Maya and the Wave debuted in California last month and will be releasing world-wide on June 4th. For those need explanation, the Maya is Brazilian big wave challenger Maya Gabeira. The Wave is Portugal’s Nazaré, her obsession, ultimate prize, and near-fatal nemesis.
The film, conceived and directed by Stephanie Johnes, follows Gabeira over more than 10 years of filming her life and her seemingly singular passion that by any criteria has been exceptional. Her love/fear relationship with one of the world’s biggest waves – Nazaré – documents her determination to slay a massive, mutant monster come hell or highwater. In her case both hell and highwater came and the film centers around this Matadora and the horn that first gores her and then tempts her back for a last brutal brush with death and destiny.
Maya Gabeira was the first women’s big wave superstar. Her stunning good looks and total dedication made her an immediate media darling. But her performances legitimized the attention she received. Charging into every accessible big wave location, she captured the XXL biggest wave title from 2007 through 2010, in four consecutive year-long, record-breaking global campaigns.
But the movie captures far more than the heroics of her waveriding. Director Stephanie Johnes deftly depicts the characters that surround her on her quest – and illuminates the arc of Maya’s journey from a small, fearless child to the deepest demons of her psychic battleground.
Back Stories
No matter whether you know her entire story or have barely heard her name, the inherent drama is emotional, riveting, and in the end, awe-inspiring. The movie benefits from the decade-long period of filming, allowing character development to play out over the years.
The supporting cast has backstories large and compelling: Her tow partner, coach and surf Svengali Carlos Burlé is a study in trust and tribulation; their evolving relationship emerges as a dramatic highlight. Her later tow partner German big wave hero Sebastian Steudtner (who coincidently holds the current world record for biggest wave ridden) is cast as the prince who saves the damsel (the most badass damsel that was ever in distress, mind you) and adds a true life love story to an otherwise platonic terrain. While no longer together romantically, Maya attributes their relationship as a catalyst for overcoming her fear. And her mother, father, and sister are captured throughout Maya’s life with their own fascinating stories.
The daughter of a well-known Brazilian fashion designer, Maya Gabeira grew up privileged but, after a period of adolescent rebellion, she discovered surfing. Her father, Fernando Gabeira, was a legendary political revolutionary—a member of MR8, the group behind the kidnapping of Charles Elbrick, American ambassador to Brazil in the 1960s. Fernando was barred from the U.S., but Maya and her mother made it her base. Dedicating the next two decades to chasing giant swells, Maya embarked on a global wave hunt from South Africa to Tahiti, breaking taboos and records in the process. Fearless, gorgeous and committed, Gabeira’s head-turning performances became definitive examples of a beautiful female capable of the most dangerous and challenging achievements. And her mother comes across as the very heart of a mama lion who protects yet encourages her young lioness.
Maya was a Billabong-sponsored team rider when I was the media director there. Having spent several years in Maya’s frequent company, I can attest to the intricate portraits director Johnes weaves in the film.
“When I was a little girl I wrote in my dairy that I wanted to surf the biggest waves in the world,” she told me more than a dozen years ago. What she could not have dreamed is the price she would pay to realize that vision.
Related: Guinness World Record Big Wave Surfer Maya Gabeira Retires
The Eight Story Fall
In 2013, Maya Gabeira nearly drowned at Nazaré in Portugal in one of the most devastating wipeouts ever witnessed. Attempting to claim the record for biggest wave surfed by a woman, she was eaten up at the bottom of an estimated eighty-foot (twenty-four-meter) beast, breaking her ankle on impact on the third massive bump while still on her board. Trapped under a set of waves, she lost consciousness. “I lost her,” her Brazilian tow partner, big-wave rider Carlos Burlé admits tearfully in one of the film’s most emotional scenes. “She was gone for about five minutes. I finally saw her floating face-down in the shorebreak. I jumped off the Jet ski, grabbed her in an armlock, and we got to the beach that way. I don’t know how. They administered CPR immediately, and she started breathing.”
CPR saved her life, but she had snapped her right fibula and herniated a disk in her lower back. When Maya took off on a fifty-foot peak in Portugal, wiping out and nearly drowning, big wave iconoclast Laird Hamilton criticized her for “not having the skill to be in the water” that day. But the number of serious wipeouts suffered by unqualified males floundering in the lineup, begged the question of Hamilton’s perspective. Former World Surf League Hawaii General Manager Jodie Wilmot put it succinctly: “If a guy had been on that wave nobody would have said a word.”
Riding Into History
Maya’s recovery and eventual triumph (the film’s central storeyline) is a marvel of resilience, fanatic focus and sheer desire. Two years after she was broken by the stupendous power of this Atlantic shelf of shoreline, she returned to Nazaré to face the same beast that almost killed her—continuing to push the limits of female big-wave surfing in pursuit of the ultimate prize. On January 18, 2018, Gabeira successfully surfed a sixty-eight-foot (nearly twenty-one meters) wave at Nazaré becoming the first female big-wave surfer recognized with a Guinness World Record.
On February 11, 2020, at the inaugural WSL Nazaré Tow Surfing Challenge event in Praia do Norte, Portugal -Maya Gabeira rode a seventy-three-foot wave into the history books. Gabeira didn’t just ride the biggest wave ever ridden by a woman. It was the biggest wave surfed by anyone in the 2019–20 winter season, woman or man—a first for women in professional surfing.
Maya and the Wave is a “don’t miss” film for anyone who prizes courage, grit, and reaching for the stars.
Production company Uncle Booster, in partnership with Film First, distributor of recent box office success ENO, helped push this film out to the global movie houses. Playing on June 4th at the California Surf Museum, tickets can be purchased at (760)721-6876
Related: Interview: Maya Gabeira Talks Books, Big Waves and Life-Changing Wipeouts