Red Bull's Documentary Series Life of Kai Hits 2 Million YouTube Views

THE MARCS takes a moment to celebrate Life of Kai: Season One, the first season of Red Bull’s flagship surf series about legendary big-wave surfer and waterman, Kai Lenny. Now passing the two million views mark on YouTube, coupled with strong viewership on Red Bull’s OTT platform, RedBullTV, THE MARCS is beyond grateful that it had the opportunity to partner with Red Bull, Tag Heuer, and Kai Lenny to help bring this inspiring story to life. Here, they share more about the work.

As a boutique production company + directing team whose mission is to create impactful work through inspiring character-driven storytelling, we’ve been fortunate to be frequent collaborators with Red Bull, having produced countless pieces across multiple subjects and genres with them. And when they approached us with the aim of creating an elevated global campaign that showcased the riveting life of Kai Lenny, while incorporating their brand ethos in the most organic and transparent way possible - we were beyond stoked. 

Just as we signed up, Tag Heuer came on as an additional brand partner, giving us even more resources to dive head-first into the process of following Kai through the ups and downs of life chasing gigantic (50’ plus) waves across the globe. 

It’s not always easy following big-wave surfers around the world, as big-wave swells only show themselves within a few days prior to their arrival. With this in mind, a key to our production model was to have nimble teams ready to mobilise and travel internationally within 24 hours of notice. This meant compact camera packages, a trusted and gritty crew, and long travel days. 

To tell the most intimate and action-packed story we could, in the field we employed Arri Amira shoulder-mounted cameras with PL zoom lenses, underwater and jet-ski/boat-stationed teams (often shooting on over cranked Red cameras), and drone cameras, all translating what Kai does on the waves into the cinematic medium. And to form a structural backbone and create added intimacy, we utilised a series of direct-to-camera interviews with Kai Lenny and his inner circle. 

Now to post-production. After a season of filling countless hard drives with mind-blowing waves and intimate personal moments, we took to the edit suites and assumed the challenging task of figuring out what amazing parts of Kai’s life would need to stay on the cutting room floor. Not easy. 

To help with the editing process, we kept a few rules in mind. We knew we wanted the story to move as fluidly as Kai does on the waves and to stay one step ahead of the audience. We knew we wanted to jump around in time using flashbacks and backstory to bolster Kai’s journey. And we knew we wanted action sequences that would knock your socks off. But most of all, we knew that everything in the edit had to work in favour of exploring what makes Kai tick from the inside out. 

The questions we were really interested in were:

• What makes Kai put his life on the line for what he loves? 
• What drives Kai to wake up every day and hone his craft, considering he’s already at the top in his field? 
• Is he content? Is he at peace? 
• If not (which he was not), why wasn’t he content? 

We can all relate to these questions, and with Kai being such an incredibly sharing person, seeing life through his lens allows us a deeper understanding of the human condition. 

One of our favourite quotes from the project comes after Kai nabs a bunch of historic wins at the end of his season, “When I was younger I cared a lot about what people thought - the awards the titles. I think just this year I kind of don’t care anymore. I’ve realised you are in this life and you have friends and family, but you’re kind of on this journey alone most of the time…and you gotta’ become your own best friend.” 

Thanks Kai. We needed that. Here’s to you!