Our top ten films at Latin America’s biggest surf and skate film festival
- Text by Alex King
- Photography by I HATE FLASH
Carving, concrete and celluloid were always a dream threesome waiting to happen. When you bring surfing, skateboarding and cinema together you get a carnival of counterculture delights. Throw in photography, live music, workshops and partying, and you’re getting close to the shape of MIMPI 2016.
Latin America’s biggest surf and skate film festival returns to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for its fifth edition – and the organisers, counterculture mag Void, have pulled out all the stops to ensure this makes a bigger splash than ever before.

Bursting out to venues across the city, this year’s MIMPI will weave together disparate lines of thought and play host to a wider debate on the shape of the culture, from building artificial waves miles from the beach, to the professionalisation of the industry, to considering surfing and skateboarding as art.

Big name international guests include France’s Benjamin Deberdt, who has documented skateboarding culture on both sides of the Atlantic for the last 15 years; and innovative American skate filmmaker Colin Read, who will be premiering his new film Spirit Quest.
But at the heart of everything are the movies – of course. So here’s our pick of the top ten, but we’ve missed so many bangers off the list, you better make it down to MIMPI to catch the rest.

Surf
Um Filme de Surfe by Bruno Zanin
Inna Di Caribbean by Arthur Bourbon
Peninsula Mitre by Julian Azulay & Joaquin Azulay
Mares del Sur by Ixa Llambías & Cristian Merello
White Waves by Inka Reichert
Skate
All Day All Night by Del Hooligans Collective
Spirit Quest by Colin Read
Valley Of A Thousand Hills by Jess Colquhoun
Putting The Tea In Team by Stuart Smith
Beyond Journal by Ville Leppänen & Juho Haapala
Find out more about MIMPI 2016, Rio de Janeiro, November 12-15.
Enjoyed this article? Like Huck on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.
You might like
How Japan revolutionised art & photography in the ’60s and ’70s
From Angura to Provoke — A new photobook chronicles the radical avant-garde scene of the postwar period, whose subversion of the medium of image making remains shocking and groundbreaking to this day.
Written by: Miss Rosen
Artifaxing: “We’ve become so addicted to these supercomputers in our hands”
Framing the future — Predominantly publishing on Instagram and X, the account is one of social media’s most prominent archiving pages. We caught up with the mysterious figure behind it to chat about the internet’s past, present and future, finding inspiration and art in the age of AI.
Written by: Isaac Muk
Leticia Bufoni is one of the greatest skaters ever. Now she’s tearing up asphalt.
Vamos, Leticia! — The Brazilian trailblazer helped rewrite the rulebook for women in skateboarding – and now she’s setting the pace behind the wheel for Porsche. For Huck’s 20th Anniversary Issue, she reflects on shredding stereotypes, building a career in male-dominated spaces, empowering the next generation, and the lessons that defined her journey.
Written by: Tracy Kawalik
The lacerating catharsis of body suspension in Hong Kong
Self-Ferrying — In one of the world’s most densely packed cities, an underground group of young people are piercing their skin and hanging their bodies with hooks in a shocking exploration of pain and pleasure. Sophie Liu goes to a session to understand why they partake in the extreme underground practice.
Written by: Sophie Liu
What we’re excited for at SXSW 2026
Austin 40 — For the festival’s 40th anniversary edition, we are heading to Texas to join one of the biggest global meetups of the year. We’ve selected a few things to highlight on your schedules.
Written by: Huck
Capturing the spirit of the ’90s surf scene with Volcom
Nineteen 90 Nowhere — The brand’s latest Featured Artist Series collection sees them tap three surfers and artists in Gony Zubizarretta, Seth Conboy and Issam Auptel, whose neo-grunge work blends the rawness of the decade with the present.
Written by: Isaac Muk