Skateboard Cinema

For my final post, I wanted to go out with a bang and give homage and praise to my all time number one favorite video part ever, Andrew Reynolds in Stay Gold (2010). Reynolds is considered one of the all time greatest and most influential legends in all of skateboarding, if not the the greatest. His career has spanned from the Birdhouse days from being co-signed by Tony Hawk into his own board company called Baker. From that time, Reynolds was known for his incredible gap skating and has often been on the forefront of charging some of the biggest spots in skateboarding’s history. Characterized with his signature frontside flip, Andrew has taken down skateboarding’s biggest monoliths as evidenced by his part in Bridhouses video The End (1998). After getting sober, eating healthy, and taking much needed ice bath’s, Reynolds set his career to reach unknown territory. 

In 2010, Andrew had taken the impossible and dangerous task of filming a video part into his early 30′s that incorporated some the most skillful and larger than life tricks ever caught on film. In Emericas video Stay Gold, he took on the famous Wallenberg gap in San Francisco by busting a backside flip over the long, elongated steps. Reynolds received the coveted cover of Thrasher Magazine for his legendary trick.

Not only did he break new territory at Wallenberg, he also Varial Heelfliped the Hollywood 16 stair set and kickflipped the Davis gap. To really put that into perspective, skaters in their twenties often can't jump down huge gaps like the younger skaters can because of the toll skateboarding has on ones body. What Reynolds accomplished was something unseen in skateboarding considering his age. Here is a graph to really put into perspective just how big was the stuff Reynolds was skating at the time:

All in all, when Reynolds had last part in the Emerica video, it changed the game and industry of skateboarding forever. He proved the limits are endless and age is a non factor as long as you push your mind past what you think you are capable of. 

Brian Anderson, to skateboarding, is your favorite skaters favorite skater. He’s a goaliath of a superhuman force standing over 6′4 feet tall while gliding gracefully across monster handrails and stair sets. Also deemed as having one of the nicest personalities in all of skateboarding, Brian is the epitome of being the truest and more formidable skateboarder to ever grace the culture. From winning SOTY (Skateboarder of the Year) in 1998 and World Cup of Skateboard title in Dortmund, Germany, in 1999, Brian had exceeded many peoples expectations. From working as a line cook based out of Connecticut to becoming skateboardings next overnight sensation thrust him into infamy. In his video part for the Girl Skateboards video Yeah, Right! in 2003, he skated famous gaps and spots that rendered his video part a classic within all of skateboard films. But it was one  achievement recently made by Brian Anderson in 2016 that truly affected people in the skate community. Brian had come out as gay, being the first major professional skateboarder to ever do so. 

His bravery and courage to stand alone as skateboarding first major gay professional skateboarder was first considered a rumor in the industry for years, but after his VICE sports documentary which premiered in 2016 did the industry start to open its arms to support him and his husband. The skateboard industry has had a shameful history of homophobia and holding up homophobic skateboarders such as Jeremy Klein, Danny Way, and Jay Adams in high esteem. Jay Adams is the prime example of homophobic attitudes being perpetuated upon the culture with his manslaughter upon a gay man who was leaving a bar in the 1970's which has since been excused because of his “legendary” status.

Brian Anderson is a symbol of change within the community, as more and more LGBTQ+ skateboarders and skate teams are coming out in droves and using skateboarding as a tool against oppression and systemic violence against them. I am proud to be apart of that queer community of skateboarders, and Brian Anderson was a big part of that. Thank you Brian Anderson, for you courage and bravery.  

Also, fun fact, Brian is the first major pro athlete in all of sports to be given a signature shoe, which is a feat of its own. 

Skateboarding in Chico is tough. The streets are cracked and janky, the cops are rude and aggressive, immature pedestrians constantly harass you, and the skatepark is filled with drug addicts and derelicts. To really gain an insightful perspective about the matter, I decided to interview my friend Miguel Perez to get his stance and insight on the subject of being a skateboarder in Chico. 

When skating to class or work, how would you describe the terrain? Do you think it's suitable for riding a skateboard?

M: Rough with lots of cracks and potholes. It helps to become familiar with the smoothest parts of the area beforehand. Semi-suitable for skating, but not really.

Why did you choose a skateboard as your form of transportation instead of something else like a bike, scooter or rollerblades?

M: While I own a bike, skateboards let you throw a manual (balancing on 2 wheels) or a trick or two on your way to class. This provides a bit more freedom than other forms of transportation do

Does skating keep you from being late to class or work?

M: Occasionally, sometimes you get caught up trying a trick

Did you have any prior experience with riding a skateboard prior to coming to Chico? If not, since picking up skateboarding, have you wanted to wanted to do more with it? (Such as learning tricks)

M: Yes, I started skating again in high school after leaving it for a year or two. Being here has kinda pushed me to do it more because I have a group of friends that also skate and part of the fun is looking for something to skate.

Have you had any accidents while skating to class? If so, can you describe them?

M: Hell yeah, you can’t have rainbows without a little rain and sometimes you’ll hit, twigs, cracks and pebbles. It either really wakes you up or just makes you want to go back home.

Have you ever felt unsafe at Chico Skatepark?

M: Yeah dude, tweakers who don’t skate love to hang out there and it’s a big no-no to be there when it gets dark. It’s usually pretty mellow in the morning when no one is there, but I try and find somewhere else to skate usually.

Have you ever gotten a ticket while skating around the Chico State Campus?

M: Not yet. Crossing my fingers. 

Looking back and growing up in the mid 2000′s and consuming skate culture/media like it was a part time job, the only woman skateboarder in the general conversation was professional Elissa Steamer. If you played any of the immensely popular Tony Hawk Pro Skater games, Elissa was the one and only option to pick if you wanted to skate as a woman. The same representative standards of women being involved in skateboarding were just as similar at the time if not worse. Skateboarding hasn’t always been the best atmosphere to champion the valuable qualities women could have brought to the culture pre 2010′s. Often referred to as a “boys club”, the skateboard industry has had a long history of bringing underlying misogynistic and chauvinist ideologies to the surface through objectifying board graphics, apparel, and an ever present dialogue carried on by  machismo skaters seeking to degrade women who choose to pick up a skateboard as a beginner. 

Then, in 2009, Zero Skateboards released a new future length video entitled Strange World with a part featuring new team rider Marisa Dal Santo. Marisa took the skateboard industry aback with her dowright wreckless demeanour, incredible style, and creative trick selection. Before Marisa, women skateboarders were not boardsliding large 10+ stair handrails or busting stylish flip tricks down gaps. Marisa was now the undisputed queen of all of skateboarding. And then just as quickly as she arrived, Marisa vanished from the skateboard world never to be seen in another Zero Skateboards video again.

Only recently has the skate culture caught up and represented women who shred as having a true and rightful place in the both skate media and the industry itself. From Nora Vasconcellos, Una Farrar, Lacey Baker, Alexis Sablone, and Leticia Bufoni, women are now in the ever present in the scene and are more visible than ever. With Lizzie Armanto gracing the most popular real estate in all of skateboarding, the cover of Thrasher Magazine in May of 2017, none of this could have been possible without Marisa truly pushing the limits of what women skaters are capable of. Nowadays, it isn’t a rare sight to see girl skaters at skate parks or simply pushing down the street.   

Citing a recent interview with Jenkem Magazine in December 2017, Marissa left the industry due to not being paid an equivalent amount to her male counterparts, a problem which persists in all areas of the socio-economic sphere of gender inequality within unequal pay. Putting yourself in dangers way for almost no pay brought an air of dissalosiument to her general outlook on skateboarding as a whole, so she left to pursue other ventures such as opening up an online shop and selling rare vintage clothing. She still continues to skate to this day, but only for the fun of it which should be the overall objective of any skater. Shred on ladies.

Full Video:

Pontus Alv, company owner and brand manager of the Swedish company Polar Skateboards, set out to convey a vision of skateboarding being recognized out of the American spotlight and into a more refined European ethos of independent prosperity in a crowded marketplace. The crowding is due to the majority of skateboard companies being based inside the United States and almost all popular skateboard media content being based in the US as well. Skate coverage and visibility for skaters outside the US bubble is one that has undergone vast scrutiny and immense adversity. Only recently has skateboarding been globalized through the advent of online videos being available for free and widely distributed with ease. Therefore, the time had come for a European skateboard company to come along and receive the proper shine it deserves, Polar Skateboards.  

While there have been skateboard videos that have been created in Europe that have stood the test of time in popular nomenclature, Polar’s film I like it here inside my mind. Don't wake me this time. (2016) has been considered one of if not the finest representation of European skateboarding to date. Being on par with the artistic conventions as the US, Pontus Alvs vision alongside motion graphics being done by Fabian Fuchs and animation done by Clem Stamation conveys a narrative structure unseen in previous skateboard films. 

For example, rider Dane Brady’s part in the video gives homage to an older skateboard video by H-Street titled Hokus Pokus (1989) by incorporating the very same title song to Danes section, Alone by The Cry. Pontus Alv establishes artistic integrity over Dane’s part by incorporating the lyrics in the song stating “have you ever sat on an empty beach?” and having Dane exit the world of skateboarding into an abandoned beach, looking confused, and chasing an umbrella. This dream sequence that Dane enters and skates to is one of the most true and beautiful sequences ever captured in a skateboard video.

As with every post, I wanted to pay homage to the video by posting one of my own skateboard photos:

Anyone familiar with the streets of San Fransisco know not to park their cars facing straight and vertically aligned with the sidewalk. The cars need to be parked facing sideways because the hills of San Francisco are gigantic concrete mesa’s slanted at near 45 degree angles spanning across the cities landscape. This is both the dream and bane of many skateboarders who claim the streets of San Francisco as their own. Anyone brave enough to ride down or “bomb” any number of the streets of SF are rewarded with an adrenaline rush mirroring a state of near death and ultimate injury. For those that find themselves on the other end of riding away unscathed from a hill bomb truly know and understand it is the ultimate and most dangerous thrill in all of skateboarding. Add the element of cars speeding by, pedestrians crossing the street, unforseen potholes and cracks in the asphalt, and any number of distractions can and will render a skater a meat sack sliding on the concrete at speeds of up to 40 to 50mph. In the year 2017, one skateboard crew based out of SF took the challenge of possible death and provided one of the most high octane skateboard films ever produced, GX1000: Adrenaline Junkie. 

Produced by Thrasher Magazine, GX1000: Adrenaline Junkie documents some of SF’s most notorious and fearless riders as they tackle some of the most difficult terrain in the world to skate.The crust and slick Bay Area streets make it difficult for even the most well endowed of skaters to attempt to ride. Led by such sakters as Sean Greene, Al Davis, and Yonnie Cruz, the tricks attempted in the video are much different from other skate videos of the same caliber. Right after a trick is done like a wall ride or flat ground 360 flip, the rider then proceeds to bomb a nearby hill in the most stylish and cutthroat way possible. If you watch the very last clip before the video ends, Sean Greene skates with reckless abandon bombing two hills, one right after another. Anyone of any background or familiarity of skateboarding itself will have a much more familiar understanding of this type of skateboarding due to the observation of the giant terrain itself. As come to tradition when I post about my favorite skateboard films, I wanted to post a picture dedicated to the riders and filmmaker. 

While I have been covering mainly semi-modern skateboard films from the new millennium, I wanted to go back and observe skateboardings most beloved roots. Coming into the early 90's, skateboarding and skate culture was essentially dead as the popularity of vert skating on ramps had reached its limit in innovation and reliability. Not every kid and adult could relate to the Tony Hawk’s or Christian Hosoi’s of the world and therefore skateboarding became stagnant but nevertheless primed for a new force to take the lead in the cultures progression. Then, 1991 a company called Blind Skateboards came into the picture producing the most influential skate video in history, Video Days.  

Spike Jonze, now an Academy Award and Oscar award winning director for the film Her (2013), started his entire career as the main videographer and director of the project. Jonze’s modest and humble beginnings in the world of cinema to becoming one of the world’s most renowned film directors proved to be a direct culmination of his work in the world of skateboarding. With such riders as Mark Gonzales, Rudy Johnson, Jason Lee (yes, the famous Hollywood actor Jason Lee), and Guy Mariano, one could view Video Days as the quintessential template for how skateboard videos should be. Raw, urban, fast, and dirty aesthetical street sections are paired with an eclectic and dynamic soundtrack that any viewer, skater or not, would enjoy. 

The quintessential magic of Video Days is its power to motivate the viewer to go out and skate. This is the ultimate goal and ethos behind any good, worthwhile skate video; to get the skater out of their chair and into the world. The films impact on the skate world was so drastic it essentially revitalized the monetary side of skateboarding into new peaks. This peak is still progressing to this day due to the freedom of skating street having much more relatability to the average viewer versus skateboarding on a large vert ramp. Anyone can skate outside their front door and the Blind Skateboards team set out to take that same spirit to new dimensions and terrain.         

Being inspired by this video and its beautiful, raw essence, I wanted to include one of my own photos as an homage and tribute to the greatest skateboard video in history, Video Days. 

The history of Alien Workshop was born out of a modest Dayton, Ohio warehouse by Chris Carter, Mike Hill, and professional skateboarder Neil Blender in 1990. Since its inception, AWS has produced some of the most avant-garde, truthful products and videos for the culture of skateboarding such as Memory Screen (1991) and Photosynthesis (2000). Remaining a top-notch and relevant company throughout its progression has had its challenges and setbacks with its most recent closure in 2014, but as of 2016 Alien Workshop has come back with full force as an independent company. This comeback only illustrates the brands iconic value as a necessary staple in the skateboard community.   

In 2009, Alien Workshop came out with its most embraced and critically acclaimed venture to date, Mindfield. The film features riders Anthony Van Engelen, Arto Saari, Dylan Rieder, Grant Taylor, Heath Kirchart, Jake Johnson, Jason Dill, Josh Kalis, Rob Dyrdek, and many more. These names might not be recognized by your average viewer, but these names make up some of the most appreciated and admired skateboarders in the community’s history. There is a term popular in skateboarding that applies to the riders in this video which is, “your favorite skaters favorite skater.”  

Mindfield (2009), filmed, directed, and edited by one of the most influential videographers in skateboard history Greg Hunt, incorporated a very diverse and quintessential soundtrack to coincide with the riders skate style and persona. Some in the community would consider it the best soundtrack ever ingrained in a skate film with such artists as Animal Collective, Elliott Smith, Dinosaur Jr., and Morrissey providing the perfect background sound to match the skaters overall aesthetic. My overall favorite part of the video is Jake Johnson’s section where he makes his introduction to the company and the world of professional skateboarding to the highest degree possible. His maneuvers are still influencing a plethora of skateboarders today far and wide by taking the “wallride” to a higher standard. A wallride is when a skater somehow carves directly up and wall and back down again, which is witchcraft in and of physics itself. Jake took this trick and did it switch which is doing it in a backwards stance than what he normally skates. This is the sports equivalent to when an MLB pitcher throws a ball with their non-dominant hand. Jake Johnson not only perfected this trick, he took it down dangerous terrain such as over stairs and above trash cans. 

I myself have never viewed a skate video as much as Mindfield simply for its artistic merit and outright viewership of the best skateboarding ever done which still holds up to today's ridiculous standards. It has lead to many great sessions in my own life and has inspired me to take up skate photography as a result. Here is one example of my photo work:

AntiHero is a board company founded by professional skateboarder Julien Stranger in 1995 during a period of time when Stranger and Jake Phelps, editor-in-chief of Thrasher Magazine, perceived skateboarding as "stale" and “uninspired”. Jim Thiebaud, owner of Deluxe Distribution based out of San Francisco, propositioned Stranger to create the company out of a twisted outdoors like aesthetic. AntiHero is a company that steers away from the traditional model of staying in hotels and being part of a regimented schedule. Rather, they are a company which embraces the great outdoors and appreciate the journey rather than the destination itself. In 2014, AntiHero released their magnum opus, Destination Unknown. Spanning just over 27 minutes, the video features riders such as Grant Taylor, Robbie Russo, Jeff Grosso, Andy Roy, and many more as they challenge dangerous terrean searching for the perfect spot to campout and skate. 

The video’s many segments are prolific, but the one that stands out the most is the full pipe section. This section begins with the team blowing up rafts, packing in as much gear as they could, and setting course down a river to reach a monolithic concrete pipe in the middle of a forest. While brushing the spot with a broom to clear out all the debris and rocks, the Deliverance banjo song beings to play. Just when the banjo reaches its climax, Grant Taylor begins to carve up 30 feet of concrete to reach maximum speeds of endless stoke. The difficulty of Grant’s maneuvers, the cooking of hotdogs on the grill as his teammates watch in awe, the absolutely beautiful forested setting, and the marvelous accompanying soundtrack brings forth a timeless work of filmography which appeals to an idealized form of living life truly in the moment. 

Destination Unknown has become a schematic to planning trips without an overall objective. While the point is to promote the brand, Julien Stranger actualizes a bigger truth in traveling down roads less traveled. Much like Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, the goal of finding inner joy is found in the human inclination towards understanding and participating in their surroundings. To reach those surroundings, one has to realize its potential upheaval and downright bottomless capacity for random occurrences. But by going forward into the unknown, we find ourselves as we most naturally are, curious.

For my first review on Skateboard Cinema, I chose a skate video which is as innocuous to the common viewer as it is enticing and fulfilling to watch, Boys of Summer. The video feels like a warped, funhouse reflection of, or perhaps antidote to, the commercialized Mountain Dew skate film from earlier 2015, We Are Blood. While there exists a tension between the commercialized side of skateboarding and the underground skate scene,  Boys of Summer becomes as idyllic as it is obscured in the overall auteurship of how skateboarding promotes itself to the masses. 

Boys of Summer is a massive undertaking of condensing footage of legendary pro’s skating alongside filmers, artists, and an endless cast of characters while being juxtaposed to 1980′s-1990′s blockbuster bubble gum media. It’s consistency is that of classic rock, oldies, and one hit wonders being the cognizant soundtrack of skateboarding in its most campy formation. Boys of Summer is essentially a 57 minute goof upon the pretentious and undermining skateboard industry. The film itself goes on to prove that you don’t need a large, expensive production to represent skateboarding properly. How is skateboarding truly? It’s about spending three hours in a dirty parking lot with your friends trying to grind a red curb and searching for that perfect ride three second ride. The rest is based in laughter, comradery, and the humbling of oneself when you bail and scrape both your knees on the rough, black asphalt. While this is not everyone's idea of fun, Boys of Summer celebrates the culture through and through. 

There are many sequences in the video that portray skateboarding breaking away from the common denominator of x-games and mainstream product promotion. None of the skate seshes in the video were planned and nothing was trying to be achieved in a commercialized demeanor. They were simply hanging out and defeating boredom through riding a wooden toy. There are no brands to identify with and no product to hawk. It simply exists to showcase fun in and of itself. And this is why Boys of Summer is one of my favorite videos of all time; for its toast to the ideal of never taking life too seriously and never taking yourself as seriously as you should. Thank you filmmaker Jeff Kutter, for your dedication towards the culture and artform.   

Hello, my name is Christopher Dubois and I am a skateboarder. When one thinks of the stereotype of a skateboarder, they think of a disheveled, grimey, anti-authority, male slacker burnout. I am here today to show you that the skateboard community is the most diverse, most welcoming, and most creative collective entity on earth. Skaters influence mass culture and fashion, facilitate small businesses from the ground up, create original works of timeless art, and overcome the pain and fragility of life itself. When I think about skaters in current time 2018, I don’t think of their gender, their race, their sexuality, or anything that ties them to an identity outside of the skateboard community. When your a skateboarder and cruise by another skateboarder, there is an instant friendship yet to be actualized. What other group of people have that inclination towards instant friendship without priorly knowing the person? When I think about skateboarding, I am happy and proud to be a skater. And I will be one forever.

The overall theme of this blog will give exposure to these ideals through the power of skateboard cinema. Skate cinema reaches a broad scope of how exactly the skateboard industry likes to present itself in video format. The videos produced by skateboard companies are called “full-lengths” which are usually 30min to 1hr long videos featuring pro riders from the companies themselves. In essence, they are promoting and showcasing their riders talents while adding in artistic montage sequences which give identity to the brands overall aesthetic. I have grown up on these skate videos and realize that most people are not aware of the existence of these films. My goal is to bring exposure to these videos and hopefully entice the reader to embrace and appreciate the culture.