Johnny Kapahala: Back on Board(2007)

Submitted by Tornado Dragon

SHORT VERSION:
After getting a much-needed lecture from Valerie about how he is trying to walk away from a family that loves him and wants him to be happy, Chris has a change of heart and accepts that it would not be bad to be a part of Johnny Kapahala’s family and have Johnny Tsunami as his stepfather. Later on, Chris shows his positive turnaround in attitude when he helps Johnny, Valerie, and Sam fix up the Surf Shack in time for its grand opening, since it was trashed by Jared, the star mountainboarder of Troy’s Dirt Devils team, a couple of nights ago.

While the grand opening is in full swing, Tsunami looks across the street and sees Troy having a big argument with Mr. Clark, Valerie’s wealthy father, outside his mountainboarding store. When he, his family, and their friends walk over to the two men to find out what is going on, they learn that Troy is planning to move back to California, and he was hoping that Mr. Clark would buy his store and turn it into a site for a new condominium development, but Mr. Clark has now decided not to. Valerie then informs Troy that, after she found out about his plan from her father, she convinced her father to pull out in order to get back at him for trying to abandon her and the other Dirt Devils, and she then declares that the Surf Shack is the new board store in town.

After Troy tells Tsunami that he will see to it that his store drives the Surf Shack out of business, Johnny challenges Troy to a mountainboarding race to settle this issue, and Tsunami sets some stakes: If Troy wins, the Surf Shack will not sell any mountainboards or any related merchandise, but if Johnny wins, then both stores can sell what they want. Troy accepts the challenge, and the race is set up in a brand-new mountainboarding park co-created by Tsunami and Mr. Clark.

Johnny wins the race, but Troy refuses to accept defeat. However, moments later, he is confronted by Officer Oki, and Oki informs him that Jared has confessed to the police that he trashed the Surf Shack on Troy’s orders. He then places Troy under arrest for having aided and abetted Jared during his crime and for coercing a juvenile to commit a felony.

That night, Tsunami gets married to Chris’ mother, Carla, and the movie ends with Johnny, Tsunami, and Chris having some fun together at a beach.

LONG VERSION:
Unbeknownst to the Dirt Devils, Troy (Phil Brown) has been trying to sell off his mountainboarding (a.k.a. dirtboarding) store so he can move back to California, but he has just recently lost a buyer because the buyer thinks that Johnny Tsunami’s (Cary Hiroyuki-Tagawa) and Carla’s (Robyn Lively) store, the Surf Shack – which is soon to open just across the street – is going to be some serious competition for Troy, given Tsunami’s status as a legendary surfer. Wondering if the Surf Shack is really just a surf shop, Troy orders his star Dirt Devil, Jared (Andrew James Allen), to go into the Surf Shack, steal their inventory sheet, and bring it back to him. Jared succeeds in his task, and Troy reads the sheet and discovers that the Surf Shack intends to sell mountainboards and related merchandise. He then goes over to the Surf Shack with Jared so he can talk to Tsunami and Carla about it, and after they conclude their short conversation, Johnny Kapahala (Brandon Baker), Sam (Jonathan “Lil’ J” McDaniel), and Chris (Jake T. Austin) return from an exciting afternoon out with Valerie (Rose McIver) (during which they meet her father, Mr. Clark [Peter Feeney], who is a wealthy businessman and is the man whom Johnny saw discussing some unknown business with his grandfather a couple of days ago). Before he leaves, Troy tells Tsunami and Carla that Chris can’t hang around his store anymore, explaining that, because they are now competitors, Chris could act as their spy. Chris comes to believe that Tsunami and his mother said something to Troy to make Troy distance himself from him, and he yells at them for it before storming out the door.

 

The next morning, Carla informs Johnny, Melanie (Mary Page Keller), and Pete (Yuji Okumoto) that Chris is gone and she doesn’t know where he is. Johnny goes with Sam to Troy’s shop, thinking that he is there, and they arrive to see Troy kicking Valerie out of the Dirt Devils for befriending Johnny and Chris as well as refusing to give her a ride to a professional mountainboarding demonstration she already got a ticket for that will be attended by champion mountainboarder Akoni Kama. Valerie complains to Johnny about her unfortunate situation and tells him that she thinks that Chris is most likely going to meet the Dirt Devils at the demo, so Sam drives her and Johnny over there. They eventually find Chris arguing with Jared over being made a member of the Dirt Devils, which Jared refuses to allow because he feels that Chris hasn’t proven himself. Troy then shows up to collect the team so they can meet with a potential sponsor, and Chris fervently pleads with Troy to let him join the Devils before telling him that he will do whatever he wants him to do to get in. Troy replies that he will grant him membership if he can both get Tsunami to agree to not sell mountainboards at his store and get Jared’s approval. Jared thus tells Chris to meet him at the gap at the bottom of the south trail at Pupukea tomorrow at 3:00 p.m. for a chance to prove his worth, and Chris readily agrees to be there. Johnny later tries to talk some sense into Chris, telling him that his negative attitude and his actions aren’t going to change the fact that his mother will be marrying his grandfather and that all he is doing is making everyone around him miserable, but Chris ignores him.

The following day, Johnny tries to keep Chris from going to Pupukea, but Chris manages to slip away from him while they are running an errand for the rehearsal dinner that night. Johnny spots Chris just as he is departing on his mountainboard that he secretly brought along in Johnny’s truck, but when he tries to go after Chris, he discovers that he flattened one of the truck’s tires before he left. He calls Valerie and has her come get him and take him to Pupukea, but when they arrive at the gap, they are too late to stop Chris from getting started on doing a mountainboard jump across it. Chris manages to pull off the stunt, but he wipes out on the landing and fractures his left arm, and Johnny orders the Dirt Devils to leave while Valerie takes off to find help. Chris is taken to the hospital, and this ends up causing the rehearsal dinner to get cancelled because Tsunami and Carla had to take the time to go to the hospital to pick him up after he received treatment. Shortly after Tsunami, Carla, and Chris return to the site of the rehearsal dinner, Officer Oki (Fasitua Amosa) shows up and informs Tsunami that the Surf Shack has been broken into and vandalized. Tsunami, Carla, Johnny, Chris, Melanie, Pete, and Valerie all head down to the store and see the state it is in, and after Oki states his belief that whoever did this knew that they would all be busy tonight, another officer walks in with Jared, having just caught him behind Troy’s store with a key to the storeroom and stashing stolen mountainboard parts in bags. Troy appears shortly afterwards, and Oki asks him if he knew anything about what Jared just did, but he denies it. Troy then apologizes to Tsunami over what he said to him the other day, and he admits that he is nervous about having him as a competitor due to his stellar surfing reputation. Troy then praises Chris for the jump he made and tells him to stop by his store tomorrow so he can officially welcome him into the Dirt Devils, but Johnny steps in and tells him that Chris won’t be joining his crew after all that has happened today. After Troy leaves, Chris yells that Johnny ruins everything for him and that he hates this family.

 

Later that night, Chris eavesdrops on a conversation that a tearful Carla is having with Tsunami, where she tells him that she made a mistake coming to Hawaii and bringing Chris here before telling him that she can’t marry him and that she will be selling the shop and taking herself and Chris back to Philadelphia. Tsunami replies that the only things he wants are to be her husband and to be Chris’ father, but Carla basically tells him that she has made up her mind. The next morning, Johnny has a discussion with his grandfather about this turn of events, and he eventually tells his grandfather that he knows the one person on this planet that Chris might actually listen to. In the next scene, Chris is paid a surprise visit from Valerie (whom Johnny chose because he knows that Chris has a crush on her), and she tells him that she has come here to talk to him because someone has to keep him from becoming a loser like Jared. She then says that Johnny is the best big brother figure he could ever ask for, and ever since Johnny came here, he has done nothing but try to be his friend and protector. Chris replies that he didn’t ask him to do any of that, prompting Valerie to inform him that Tsunami had asked him to. She wisely tells Chris that he has this whole family of people who love him and want to be with him and want him to be happy, and she doesn’t understand why he would want to walk away from that. Later on, Chris speaks to Johnny and accepts that he is to blame for everything that has gone wrong with both the shop and the wedding, and he tells Johnny that he should’ve listened to him when he tried to keep him from making that jump at Pupukea. He then states that he wants to fix everything, but he doesn’t know how, and this spurs Johnny to come up with the idea of having them, Sam, and Valerie fix up the shop so it will open on schedule. After they finish, they have all the adults come down and check it out, and Chris tells his mother that he doesn’t want to move and thinks that he could like it here, after which he accepts Tsunami as his new stepfather.

 

Later on, while Tsunami and company are conducting the grand opening of the Surf Shack, Mr. Clark is shown leaving Troy’s store and having a heated argument with Troy about a deal that they were trying to negotiate but has now fallen through. Tsunami and Pete walk over to them, and Tsunami gets in between them and asks what is going on. Mr. Clark explains that Troy was hoping that he would buy his store as a site for his new condominium development after Troy’s previous buyer backed out, and he informs the Dirt Devils – much to their surprise and disappointment – about Troy’s plan to move back to California. Valerie then informs Troy that, after learning of this plan from her father, she was the one who convinced him to not go through with the deal in order to get back at Troy for trying to abandon the Dirt Devils, and she then declares that they don’t need his store anymore and that Tsunami’s store is the new board store in town. Troy dismisses the Surf Shack’s prospects, but then, Akoni Kama (himself) suddenly appears and gets Tsunami’s attention, wanting to talk to him about selling his mountainboards at the Surf Shack. Angered by this, Troy tells Tsunami that his store will inevitably drive the Surf Shack out of business, and he will make sure that that happens. Having heard this, Johnny gets Troy’s attention and challenges him to a mountainboarding race to settle this issue, and Tsunami sets some stakes: If Troy wins, the Surf Shack will turn over all their mountainboards and related merchandise to him and stop selling them at their store, but if Johnny wins, then both stores can sell what they want. Thinking that this will be an easy victory for him, Troy accepts the challenge and its stakes, and Mr. Clark informs everyone that he has just the spot to hold the race at. Johnny and his friends and family then find out that the race will be held in a brand-new mountainboarding park that both Tsunami and Mr. Clark worked together to create, since Tsunami wanted there to be a safe place for kids to go mountainboarding. Mr. Clark then explains to Chris that Tsunami conceived of this place with him in mind so he can have a place to do what he loves.

 

After a pretty back-and-forth race, Johnny defeats Troy, but Troy angrily tells him and his family and friends that he isn’t conceding to them. Just then, Oki confronts Troy and tells him that he is here to talk to him about Jared wrecking the Surf Shack. Troy replies that he has nothing on him, but Johnny reminds Troy that, on the night of the break-in, he said he had heard about Chris’ jump, and the only way he could’ve known about that would be if he had talked to Jared. Oki informs Troy that Jared has given a full confession stating that he trashed the Surf Shack on Troy’s orders, then places him under arrest for aiding and abetting Jared and for coercing a juvenile to commit a felony. Shortly afterwards, Tsunami and Carla tell their friends and loved ones that their wedding is back on.

 

Tsunami and Carla get married that night, and the movie closes with Johnny, Tsunami, and Chris having some fun together at a beach.