Skateboard

Skateboarding is a pretty ancient depiction of both skateboarding culture and technology as manufacturers somehow hit upon the new, revived fad that was gaining more interest than it had when skateboards first made an appearance in the late 50s and early 60s.

The movie itself is rather stupid, especially when you have Dogtown's Z-boy Tony Alva only playing a supporting role while a wiener like Lief Garret got something of a starring role as a burgeoning member of the skate team. With Alva, they wouldn't have needed stunt men.

Manny Bloom is a washed up promoter of many failed opportunities. Owing a large debt to a bookie, he surmises that his only shot at squaring his arears is to promote a skate team. Now, being that this is the early days of skateboarding, Manny seemed like a fellow out of his mind for taking such a big risk on a sport that was still developing, never having had the extreme commercial following it does today. But Manny finds a bunch of misfit skateboarders (boys and girls) that he convinces to join a team with him as manager. As the story rolls along, Manny looks pretty pathetic, and fails to earn any respect from his team, which likewise have their own assorted problems. So, in that Mighty Ducks kind of tradition, he has to work hard with the team, so that they may win the championship that Manny has bet everything on.

Though terribly corny, the movie is a rather good look at the early days of skateboarding. More like when the sport modeled gymnastics as competitors in their goofy uniforms and flimsy protective gear rolled around on shiny maple floors with their twenty-four inch boards doing nose wheelies and hand stands. To think, Tony Alva, was part of the skating team (the Z-Boys of Dogtown) that competed against fool skateboarding like that and helped turn the entire skateboarding culture upside down (see the documentary, Dogtown and Z-Boys).

This is actually a pretty decent movie for a B skater movie. What makes it cool is that they used a lot of real skaters! You will recognize a lot of the skaters from this movie once they start doing competitions. Even some old name brands like Sims. Plotwise it's a simple plot. Older dude who looks WAY older than 31 when he started filming this who is balding, fat and has a lot of gray in his hair. He looks about 50. The Nurse lady reminds me of a Sarah Silverman, but I am not a fan of hers, and in the main LA Wheels group you have Tony Alva. Then there is the Sims brand girl, Laura Thornhill, who I had a huge crush on even though she was almost 20 years older than I am. I saw the movie at first when I was very young, and didn't realize when it was filmed and that she was a lot older than I was.

All that I can say is that the other guy that reviewed this movie knows nothing about the history of skateboarding. In the 1970s skateboarding was one of the greatest spectacles of the time. There were actually skateboard World Championships which drew grand crowds and the invents did include slalom(weaving in and out of cones) and downhill races... I found the other guy to be completely asinine in his reasoning. This movie has a cameo of Tony Alva of Dogtown fame. Who recently was featured in the video game Tony Hawk's American Wasteland, and the feature film Lords of Dogtown and the documentary Dogtown and Z-Boys. I would recommend this movie to anyone who loves skateboarding and its history because this is clearly a part of it...

GRADE: A+, excellent

Manny is in debt to Sol, among others, and he has to come up with an idea to make money quickly. Earlier, he nearly ran into some kids who were skateboarding in the road. When he sees one of them outside his window, he pitches the idea of a skateboarding team to Sol, who reluctantly accepts this chance to get his money back and then some.

Manny knows nothing about skateboarding. He doesn't even realize there are already teams, and as talented as the kids are, it's hard to believe at first anyone will pay money to see them.

A number of problems get in the way of the team's success. One is the need for someone to supervise them, like a parent. So Millicent is hired. Of course, as often happens in sports movies, one of the kids thinks he is too good to follow the rules. Later, the events really look like something worth seeing.

I didn't see anything here approaching good acting, but Manny, Millicent and the kids were all easy enough to like. Manny was certainly funny because he was such a loser. And the kids certainly had talent on skateboards if nothing else. The situation was hard to believe but was executed well enough.

I seriously question any reference to this being a 'family' movie. The sound went out a number of times, and other times it sounded like words had been substituted, and while tame by today's standards, the sex talk seemed pretty frank.

If you're not looking to use your brain and if your expectations are not high, I suppose this was a pleasant enough film.

You gotta love it! These guys (and girls) have what it takes to be the best skateboard team ever, it takes skill,heart, and determination to get to the top of the game. The action was fast and fearless witch turned me on to the sport of skateboarding. Skateboard rocks!