Subscribe today using voucher code SUMMER22 for an extended free trial

Subscribe to watch - 14-day free trial, then £6.99 a month

Point Break 15 rating

Kathryn Bigelow’s pulse-pounding action thriller and heady bromance, with Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze.

Action and Adventure 1991 122 mins

Director: Kathryn Bigelow

CC

Overview

A quintessential big-budget thriller, with director Kathryn Bigelow utilising the physical prowess of her two leads to tell the story of an FBI agent drawn into a cat-and-mouse game with surfing bank robbers. Working on his partner’s hunch that a spate of bank robberies is being committed by a tight-knit gang of surfers, undercover agent Johnny Utah infiltrates the California surfing fraternity to uncover the identity of the ‘Ex-Presidents’, who commit heists while wearing facemasks of Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Jimmy Carter. But Johnny comes under the charismatic spell of Bodhi, a free-style philosopher obsessed with extreme sports, becoming hooked on the adrenaline-rush of a life on the edge.

Racing from one fast-paced and technically dazzling set piece to the next, with action unfolding on the surf, in the sky and through the streets of LA, Kathryn Bigelow simultaneously relishes and deconstructs the tropes of the ‘bromantic’ action spectacular.

Accessibility