Under Review

?In the opening of Riding Giants, a documentary now in theaters that chronicles big-wave surfing, Laird Hamilton takes the measure of Jaws, a 60-foot swell off the coast of Peahi, Hawaii. Watching him in that adrenaline-drenched moment, you just might get a rush of your own. Director Stacy Peralta (Dogtown and Z-Boys) uses awesome archival surfing footage to tell the story of three men who find supreme pleasure in trying to tame the sea. Greg (the Bull) Noll, now 67, is a stocky Californian who headed to Hawaii in the 1950s and caught a swell during the 20th century's biggest monsoon. Jeff Clark, 46, discovered Mavericks, the frigid, black, shark-infested waters of Half Moon Bay, Calif., in 1975, and surfed them alone for 15 years. But it's Hamilton, 40, who revolutionized the sport in the early 1990s by using a personal watercraft to tow-in to huge waves like those at Jaws. Riding Giants ends with Noll choking up while describing his 25-year relationship with Waimea Bay, proving once again that love stories make compelling cinema.
—Yi-Wyn Yen

?Playing in the 119-year-old Cape Cod Baseball League can be humbling, we learn in Touching the Game, which airs nationally Saturday at 4 p.m. on WGN. College stars accustomed to aluminum bats routinely see their averages plummet when they switch to the CCBL's wood. But Game really scores when it goes off the field. The kids, many of whom are months away from big contracts (more than 200 current major leaguers played on the Cape), bunk with host families and work menial jobs for minimum wage. The Reds' Sean Casey, who now makes $6.8 million a year, toiled in a supermarket, where he purposely dropped bagels on the floor—so they couldn't be sold and he could take them home to eat.
—Lisa Altobelli