Talk Story with Chris Cook

Chris Cook knows Kauai. He knows of its people, its places, its culture — and its movies.

The historian, author, editor and surfer was on island recently to promote the release of his book, “The New Kauai Movie Book: Films made on the Garden Island.”

We talking lots of movies, too.

Since 1933, more than 60 feature films have been shot on Kauai. You can start with White Heat in 1933, continue on to Voodoo Island (Silent Death) in 1956, Blue Hawaii in 1961, Raiders of the Lost Art in 1980 and Jurassic Park in 1992. The year of 2010 was a big one, with the shooting of Soul Surfer, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and The Descendants.

“It goes back to the 1910s. They used to come here and shoot scenes here for tourism. That was the first movie making on the island,” he said.

Pretty much everything you want to know about movie making on Kauai is in this 168-page, softcover book highlighted with colorful photographs and plenty of detail on the sets, the scenes and the stars.

“I was in some of the movies and I know some of the filmmakers. I wasn’t here for all the movies, but I was here for a bunch of them,” he said.

Cook moved to Kauai in the late ‘70s and stayed until 2005. In between, he was the editor of The Garden Island, a surfer, researcher and author of books including “Kauai, the garden island: A pictorial History,” “Guide to Kauai,” and “Islands of Wonder: Kauai.”

He also worked on the corporate side and was an economic tourism specialist.

It was good to be back, he said. He found time for surfing, visiting friends, hanging out and giving talks to travel writers.

Moving back to Kauai is a possibility, too.

“I get drawn back to Kauai over and over,” Cook said.

Today, he lives in California, where he is working on a book about Henry Obookiah, one of the first native Hawaiians to become a Christian.

“My focus now is to get this book written. Hopefully, I’m going to come back in June with the book. I’m laying the seeds for a book tour next year,” he said.

TGI: Why was it important to you to publish the first Kauai movie book?

CHRIS COOK: I wrote the first edition of the Kauai Movie Book in 1996, in a year when the island was still recovering from the devastation of Hurricane ‘Iniki. I felt the book would give a boost to the people of Kauai, and the story is told mostly from their point of view. The book was birthed to serve as a fundraiser for the Wilcox Hospital Foundation, to complement the organization’s annual gala, the theme that year was Hollywood and Kauai. Claire Morris, then in public relations for the hospital, came up with the concept, but didn’t have the free time to write the book. Then WHF Executive Director Marion Penhallow recruited me to work with Mutual Publishing’s Bennett Hymer on the book. I already had an interest in, and knowledge of, the Kauai-made movies. I wrote the text for the first Kauai film locations promotional brochure published in the late 1980s by the County of Kauai, Office of Economic Development then led by Darryl Kaneshiro during the administration of Tony Kunimura. And I had worked as a tourism specialist in the OED office, working in the same office with Kauai Film Commissioners Ken Levine and later Judy Drosd, both during the administration of JoAnn Yukimura. I watched Jurassic Park go from a location scout for a dinosaur movie to an international blockbuster film.  

TGI: What in the updated version is not in the original?

CC: The updated book features a new section of photos and narratives about the major feature films made on Kauai since 1996, plus a look at how Kauai movie making has been promoted over the past 100 years. The films include The Descendants, Pirates of the Caribbean – On Stranger Tides, Soul Surfer, about 15 film productions in all. A memorial photo of my good friend Dave Boynton, the Kauai Movie Book photographer for the first edition, is featured on the title page. Dave, who worked as a reporter at The Garden Island back in the 1990s, died in 2007 from a fall while on a sea turtle photo shoot in remote Miloli‘i Valley on Na Pali.

TGI: Out of all the movies filmed on Kauai, what was your favorite, and why?

CC: That’s a tough one to answer. I’m really intrigued by White Heat, the first feature filmed on Kauai, on the west end mostly at Waimea, in 1933. However, Raiders of the Lost Ark, South Pacific, The Descendants, and others also come to mind. I’m personally attached to Soul Surfer as my family and the Hamiltons are close friends, and to David Cunningham’s To End All Wars in which I played a Scottish officer fulfilling a long-time dream of acting in a World War II movie.

TGI: What was the story behind the shooting of Raiders of the Lost Ark?

CC: It was an interesting movie, what was going on, the back story of the filming here. Kauai is the first scene in the movie.

You see Indiana Jones from the back walking up to the mountain, That’s not Harrison Ford. That’s Will Welch. He used to be a school principal here. They were shooting little side scenes with Will Welch as Harrison Ford.

What was going on, Steven Spielberg was under a tremendous amount of pressure. The movie before Indiana Jones was ‘1941’ starring John Belushi. It was a big budget film that bombed. So his credibility was on the line. His future was on the line with Indiana Jones. If Indiana Jones bombed, his future could have been real dim. It was on the downward slide in Hollywood. Indiana Jones was a smash hit. It brought him back.

I think because the movie was so successful, and Kauai really helped because of the locations, that’s why he brought Jurassic Park here. He always had a liking to Kauai.

TGI: What do you see as the key impact the movie industry has had on Kauai?

CC: Along with the boost of tens of millions of dollars to the economy, the 40-plus feature films have shown the incredible beauty of the island and its people to a global audience in an idealized manner. The movies give visitors a touchstone to Kauai, they arrive with a familiarity and enchantment with the island through this connection.

TGI: Does all this attention from movies help or hurt Kauai?

CC: Besides the obvious financial benefits, the movies provide a cinematic scrapbook of how the island looked over the decades since the first professional film footage was shot here in the 1910s, and give local residents the ongoing, unique opportunity of appearing in a major film, usually as an extra. The films add an allure to Kauai that draws visitors, I know George Clooney’s The Descendants has put a bright spotlight on Hanalei town that wasn’t there before. Whether this publicity is good or bad for the Island would depend on ones viewpoint of the ongoing changes to the post-sugar plantation era culture.

TGI: Do we have a lot of movie stars who live here?

CC: Some have second homes here, like the actors Ben Stiller and Julia Roberts. The late Jurassic Park author Michael Crichton did reside in Hanalei, and the actor Pierce Brosnan seems to be an island regular. Back in the 1980s Gilligan’s Island star Bob Denver lived for a time a secluded life in Wainiha Valley. Showing Kauai aloha, local residents are known to respect the privacy of celebrities. I interviewed Harrison Ford for an article in The Garden Island during the making of Six Days/Seven Nights, and he concurred about the respect shown him on Island.

TGI: Do you know of any movie projects headed our way?

CC: Kauai’s spectacular locations are constantly in demand by filmmakers shooting movies, television productions, documentaries and commercials. Kauai Film Commissioner Art Umezu is busy assisting them. Helping them too are Kauai Visitors Bureau Executive Director Sue Kanoho. Local casting and production assistance comes from folks like Angela Tillson of Whale of a Time Productions and Eddie Abubo of Kauai Productions. Through all these efforts, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a new feature film announced at any time for Kauai.

Teasers offering a glimpse of Kauai appear in films, too. I just watched an advance screening of Ben Stiller’s new Christmas season film The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. Stiller gives a call out to Kauai through a bulletin board of photos in Walter Mitty’s office at Life magazine in Manhattan. Stiller appears to really study Kauai and its surfing subculture. In his Tropic Thunder film the cover of a book about the late 1960s-70s ultra wealthy decadent surfer Bunker Spreckles, who surfed Kauai’s North Shore, appears in a scene set in a Hollywood office. The Walter Mitty photos feature Hanalei-raised surfer Laird Hamilton riding a SUP at Hanalei, plus a photo of life-long Kauai surfer and canoe paddler/sailor Nick Beck of Hanalei riding a long board at Hanalei Bay. The Beck photo was taken in the early 1960s by Nick who pulled a string attached to a board-mounted camera to click the photo; it actually appeared in Life as a large photo spread in the early 1960s, you can find it online. Famed Sports Illustrated photographer Walter Iooss set up the photo. As was common in the 1960s and 1970s, Kauai surfers avidly kapued any publicity about surfing waves on Kauai, anyone publishing photos of local surf breaks was in big trouble. The caption on the Life photo says it’s Nick riding a wave on Oahu.

TGI: Are there places that seem to be particularly popular with the movie industry?

CC: The North Shore’s dramatic beauty, similar to that of Tahiti, of French Polynesia, is a major draw. Mauka locations provide a wild jungle setting for films, yet are in close reach of accommodations and all the luxuries of a Kauai visit. Anywhere in the wide range of vistas and environments found in every corner of Kauai could attract the eye of a filmmaker, sometimes as a secondary scene to the more prominent locations.

TGI: Have locals been in movies shot here?

CC: Almost everybody on the island if you’ve lived here a long time, you’ve been in a movie or your wife has been. You know somebody that’s been in the a movie.

For the visitor, an easy way to relate to Kauai is through the movies. They know the movies. It adds something to their visit here. It’s a good introduction to Kauai. They know the movies.