Lee Wilson and Jared Mell star in "The Mystery Machine"

The web clip, the Insta clip, the short internet vid. The best they can hope to do is wither away on the online vine long enough to accumulate gnats. They become like flowers without the chance to bloom, their beauty never realized, covered with locusts and buried deeper than a hole in the ocean floor.

It is very rare in this 2020 world of content carpet bombs that something so genuinely warm and tasty gets me to stop scrolling long enough to engage and smell the roses. This new short film called “The Mystery Machine” did though…and it stars one of my favorite surfers Lee Wilson — surfing’s journeyman who rarely journeys these days because his hometown is where the best waves always are, and Jared Mell, a literal human reincarnation of the year 1976.

After months of being chased from waves and told beaches were closed throughout Bali, this strange “Venus Fly Trap” of a wave let the boys back in and made for an exploration style discovery right in their own backyard. Close your eyes and go back in time in this really well done short film. —Travis Ferré