WIND: Best America’s Cup Movie – Bar None

FROM THE MASTHEAD: Biff Halyard

I’ve said it. This little sleeper movie, WIND, usually gathering dust in the $5 bin at your local DVD shop, takes the cake, in fact, the whole party as maybe the best sailing movie EVER MADE. The sailing seems authentic, and the drama touches on critical themes campaigns faced, in recent years.

It’s a must-see for sailors all. Action, drama, technology and a silly love story (Matthew Modine and Jennifer Grey) - - what else could one want in a sailing movie?

It cleverly begins, not on America’s Cup boats, but on Australian trailer-sailors in small, super-boats with outsized rigs and fearless sailors. America’s Cup skippers take the helms and call the shots. Places change quickly; a small sense of what’s to come on America’s Cup boats begins to take hold.

Later, the sappy plot thickens, but the on-water sailing photography stands your hair on end. This is the real (Hollywood) deal. Muscles bulge, tempers flair, skippers rage, boat parts strain (some break) and sails shred.

Themes of extreme teamwork under fire, needless intrigue and financial uncertainties mirror many of the ACTUAL EVENTS that have marred previous matches.

Post cup presentation, the yelling and screaming the moneyed many, the America’s Cup boat sits silently back at the dock—sheets akimbo and gear askew. The winners and losers mostly at the bar, but the boat sits quietly, back at the barn. Waiting. Effortlessly floating among other, mere cruisers, racer-cruisers, one-designs and custom one-offs.

What awaits this tireless Cup warrior—this Old Man of the Sea after a handful of important races? What lies ahead for this one-regatta winner? Hopefully, not the bone yard or being put on sorry display at Disneyworld, the way that high-end three-hulled monster used in that ugly movie “Waterworld.” This Cup Veteran awaits the hopes and dreams of the next eager sailing syndicate willing to risk all for races that can be won and lost by one, tiny second.