Gidget

Paul Wendkos's 1959 film is among the first to bring Californian surf culture to the screen. Francie is seventeen and would rather spend her time in the water while her friends are busy finding boyfriends. An accident puts her among the surfers and she tries to get into the group, who give her a nickname made from the words for girl and midget because of her size. The film is about a teenager's effort to be accepted and presents surfing as a way of living, drawing the adult figure in the group, Kahuna, as a man who has refused an ordered life. It started the wave of beach films that ran for years afterwards. The tone is light and the period's morality is plain. Who it's for: viewers curious about American youth films of the fifties and surf culture. Who it's not for: anyone who will find the era's gender roles uncomfortable; the film does not question them.