The Surfer for the win.
There was once a time when surfers had a corner on the “cool slang” market. Words and phrases like “Cowabunga” or “totally tubular” were staples in every rad kid’s vocabulary. Surfers maybe taking for granted our linguistic monopoly. Alas, we were caught flatfooted by the fast-moving internet culture and now are buried underneath a pile of TikTok inspired “skibidies” and “alphas” and “sigmas,” “auras” and “bibiddybobbdies.”
Decidedly not surf.
But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Nicolas Cage is the sun. Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, who is already sick and pale with grief, that thou her maid art far more fair than she.
Yes, per reports, a new bit of surf slang is trending all thanks to Guarding Tess star from his highly-anticipated new film The Surfer.
And you have certainly been salivating over the Lorcan Finnegan directed film first introduced a year-ish ago and described thusly:
When a man returns to Australia to buy back his family home after many years in the U.S., he is humiliated in front of his teenage son by a group of local surfers who claim ownership over the secluded beach of his childhood. Wounded, he defies them and remains at the beach, demanding acceptance. As the conflict escalates he is brought to the edge of his sanity and his identity is thrown into question.
A grumpy local dream.
Well, it premiered at Cannes to much acclaim and, again, our first bit of slang in decades. Metro UK describes the genesis of the idiom wherein Cage’s character is starving, kills a rat, takes a bite then…
After being interrupted he pockets the rat to use later, which comes during a fight when he truly snaps – resulting in his character pulling the rat from his pocket and shoving it into his opponent’s mouth.
‘Eat the rat!’, he exclaims wildly – and thus another iconic Cageism is born, joining his collection of iconic quotes.
Indeed, the star himself seems aware of how fans may catch onto this one, as he whipped the audience at Cannes up into a frenzy by roaring ‘Mangez le rat!’ (his newest meme-worthy line, translated) during the film’s six-minute standing ovation.
Eat the rat, my bro.
Skibidi.