MOVIE REVIEW : Aussie Filmmaker’s Surf Movie Has Great Rides and Photography : ‘All Down the Line’ is full of acrobatic maneuvers, and the narrative has a personable quality. Unfortunately, the film has no women surfers and only one American.

The weakness of surf films for a general audience is the sameness in imagery. Scenes of whipping cuts and bottom turns through gleaming waves, no matter how spectacular for the 17-year-old Huntington Beach regular, may leave his high school math teacher yawning after the 10th exposure.

No matter the quality of the movie, it really comes down to how enthralled you are by the sport, one of the most sensational around.

Where the surfer and committed fan find subtlety and variation in each frame, the uninitiated may come up with predictability and repetition.

A new entry in the field, “All Down the Line” by Australian filmmaker Paul Witzig, is now being promoted on the West Coast by veteran San Clemente surf-movie distributor Jeff Neu. (The film was shown for three days last week in San Clemente, and Neu said he is lining up additional screenings in Orange and Los Angeles counties in coming weeks.)

This one runs the usual risks of the genre, but that said, it’s fair to add that “All Down the Line” is a striking example, full of acrobatic wave-riding captured by Witzig’s knowing camera. And since these films historically find a market with real surfers, that’s as valid an endorsement as any.

Beyond the sheer athleticism of great surfing, much of the beauty comes from its improbability--the surfer as an intrusion in a pure seascape, doing his best to master it. The conflicting images can exhilarate, even in Southern California where they are so commonplace.

The camera needs to show when a surfer fits in, becoming a natural adjunct to the environment while dominating it. A good surf movie captures that with daring photography and seamless editing that link the images gracefully. For the most part, Witzig and his editor, Zsolt Kollanyi, do that, presenting an array of rides filmed in Hawaii, Australia and Java.

They smartly focus on Aussie Tom Carroll, a two-time world champion who has become something of an icon for younger surfers.

His uniquely powerful style, with a trademark shoulder and torso churning to complete maneuvers, are lingered on as he works his way through two-story monsters, 10-foot tubes and the smaller, more routine waves that fill up most of a surfer’s day.

He’s a pleasure to watch, as are Ross Clark Jones, Jeff Booth, Dave MacAulay, Carwyn Williams, Peter McCabe and the remarkable 13-year-old, Daniel Wills.

“All Down the Line” does succumb to a little regional chauvinism: Booth is the only American surfer. And, unfortunately, no women surfers are featured. Witzig’s world of surfing remains a generally macho affair.

Besides the accomplished photography, the requisite narrative ( all surf movies have surfers talking about the glory of surfing) has a personable quality centering on Carroll’s relationship with the other guys, especially the tiny Wills.

Carroll’s reflections on the sport also present some insight.

At one point, he talks excitedly about how his perceptions become distorted when riding, and he looks for the familiar, otherworldly moment when all light “gets grainy and intense.” You can almost believe him when he whispers the usual cliche that “it’s all pretty cosmic, really.”

The movie sputters when Witzig tries to get cute, as when he brings in a bunch of pretty Aussie girls who rip off their school uniforms to reveal hip clothes and hip chicks. The get-down dancing scene in a disco, complete with a make-out moment or two, is clumsily staged and a little embarrassing.

Fortunately, there’s little of this male adolescent fantasy stuff. Witzig knows what his audience came for--he promptly returns to the sea, where his camera and the surfers seem most comfortable.