Simon Baker says Breath stars Samson Coulter and Ben Spence had to ‘unlearn how to surf’

Simon Baker spent almost a year trying to find the right teens to star as board riding besties Pikelet and Loonie in his movie adaptation of Tim Winton’s ripping coming of age drama Breath.

THE authenticity of the surfing scenes in Simon Baker’s terrific directorial debut Breath is no accident.

Baker spent almost a year trying to find the right teens to star as board riding besties Pikelet and Loonie in his movie adaptation of Tim Winton’s ripping coming of age drama Breath.

He eventually found what he was looking for in the form of first-time actors and gun surfers Samson Coulter (Pikelet) and Ben Spence (Loonie), whose characters form an unlikely bond with an older pro surfer Sando (played by Baker) and his wife Eva in 1970s WA.

Samson Coulter in a scene from Breath.

“It’s a lot easier to act than it is to surf,” Baker says of his search for Breath’s stars.

Spence says Baker’s realxed manner immediately put him and Coulter at ease.

“I think when I first met him I thought he was just going to be this big kind of like Mr Hollywood, weird kind of guy but as I got to know him ... I found out he’s just kind of like a typical Aussie character,” he says.

Co-stars Samson Coulter, Simon Baker and Ben Spence at Event Cinemas Pacific fair for the Queensland premiere of Breath. Picture: Andrew Carlile / MEGA

Coulter, a gun surfer from Sydney who competed in this year’s Burleigh and Tweed Coast Pros, says unlearning how to surf proved the greatest hurdle he and Spence faced filming Breath.

“That was the hardest bit — trying to learn how to surf again. Learning how to not surf,” he says.

“Early on we had to surf on coolites and pretend that we didn’t know the ocean at all but we’d grown up in it so that was probably the hardest part,” Spence says.

Ben Spence and Samson Coulter in a scene from Breath, filmed in WA in six weeks back in 2016.

“Later on in the film we got to surf better waves and that’s where we were comfortable and we just started surfing how we wanted to — kind of normal but still putting on an act.

“We were pretty much just surfing naturally but they picked out the clips that suited our characters and what they were going through at the time.”

Baker, who also surfs in the film, says the teens had to suppress their competitive instincts chasing waves.

“You gotta understand — these kids surf in competitions all the time,” he says.

Simon Baker and Tim Winton on the set of Baker's film adaptation of Winton's 2008 novel Breath in WA in 2016. Picture Supplied.

“Samson’s been competing since he was nine, so whenever they surf it’s like performance — ‘I’m gonna rip, I’m gonna tear’.

“The first time these guys both went out on the single fins (in the film), the first fibreglass boards, I went down the beach and gave them the single fins and said ‘this’ll slow them down, watch this’.

“Nup. They were like throwing the tail and I was like you boys are going to have to take it easy. It’s the ‘70s all right? No drop wallet or cutbacks ...

“Ben kind of picked it up quick but Samson struggled. He didn’t want to surf bad. He was like ‘I’m gonna surf as good as I can.’”

Simon Baker and his then 16-year-old son Claude Baker at Ocean Beach, Denmark, in WA, in 2016 before filming started on Baker’s stellar adaptation of Tim Winton's novel Breath.

A lifelong surfer and film fan determined to ensure he did surfing justice on the big screen, Baker enlisted commerical water cinematographer Rick Rifici (Otherlife, Drift, Adore) to lead the film’s four-week in-on-and-under-water shoot around Denmark, WA.

“I wanted to make a film that wasn’t solely about surfing but the surfing was authentic,” Baker says.

“Weirdly enough, there’s a lot of people out there that have been involved in the world of capturing surfing in different ways and all of them had this yearning to see it done in a very authentic way and with a strong narrative.

Living in the ‘70s — Samson Coulter, Simon Baker and Ben Spence star in Breath. Picture: David Dare Parker/Supplied.

“As a surfer, you grow up and you watch movies, narrative films that have surfing in it, and you always have such an expectation and then you’re like ‘aah, shit — another cheesy surf sequence’ where you look at the actors and it’s dead flat and then ooh, glossy long lens shot and they’re out somewhere that’s called Australia but it’s not — it’s somewhere else and as surfers you know, you know that’s Teahupoo (Tahiti) or that’s not Rincon (in southern California).

“You know all the spots — and we’re a little bit of a tough audience,” Baker says.

“If I thought it was bullshit, then everyone else was going to think oh it’s bull.”

Event Cinemas Pacific Fair hosted the Queensland premiere of Simon Baker’s new film Breath this week as part of the Gold Coast Film Festival program. The screening was followed by a Q & A with Baker and his young co-stars Ben Spence (centre) and Samson Coulter.

Baker says he quickly learned capturing surfing for the screen isn’t as easy as surfing looks.

“It’s hard. It’s really hard,” he says.

“The ocean is not an easy place to shoot a film on. I don’t want to do it again. I think we got away with it by the skin of our teeth.

“I can walk away — know when to fold them. That’ll do me. I want land-lubbing films from now on.”

Breath opens nationally on May 3.

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