Jordan: This movie has the best soundtrack ever.
Brandon: You're just saying that because you love the 70's. Any movie set in the 70's has the best soundtrack to you.
Jordan: Holy shit! That's "Long Way to Go" by Alice Cooper! This movie has the best soundtrack ever!!!
Brandon: See my previous comment.
ThePants and I saw Lords of Dogtown tonight on aoife's recommendation. And, for the record, it does have the best soundtrack ever:
Jimi Hendrix "Voodoo Chile" and "Fire"
Deep Purple "Space Truckin'"
The Stooges "Loose" and "T.V. Eye"
Alice Cooper "Long Way to Go"
Nazareth "Hair of the Dog"
David Bowie "Suffragette City"
Rise Against! performing "Nervous Breakdown" by Black Flag
Rot Stewart "Maggie May"
Mike Ness performing "Death or Glory" by The Clash
If that line-up doesn't appeal to you, then I can do nothing to help you. Aside from the glorious soundtrack, which was so good, that I would've watched a blank screen for two hours if they promised to play it, the movie was also great. Here, is my half-assed review with accompanying social commentary. Enjoy:
Leaving the theater, I saw a movie poster for the new Martin Lawrence movie where he is a highschool basketball coach or some nonsense and I was reminded of the character of Dominique Francon in The Fountainhead; and her aversion to living in a world that could produce work of great quality and work of utter, unremarkable shit -- and of living in a society that very often, could not tell the difference.
Lords of Dogtown is one of those movies that has the guts to admit it's about real people, living real lives. I know it's based on a true story and real people and all of that, but it's not always that obvious in movies. Not many movies would have the skillfulness to show Jay and Tony's home lives as an explanation for the decisions they made. Nor would they have the craft to intuition to contrast this against Stacy's decisions.
A crew of street kids are not treated as a bunch of vandals, drinking and fucking and doing drugs with reckless abandon because they are cool and it's edgy... they are treated as they are, kids with no guidance turning to each other for support and to the older surfers like Skip for "parental" guidance. Stacy (the writer) and Catherine (the director) really nail that intimate connection between the older and the younger crew; that sense that the younger need to prove themselves to fit in with the older, but that the older look out for the younger and protect them.
Not to take anything away from what was an excellent performance by Heath Ledger, but he was obviously instructed to play the part as if his character were Val Kilmer's Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's The Doors.
Of course, it all comes crashing to pieces as soon as big money is involved.
But, unlike many movies, and certainly going full-tilt against the zeitgeist, this story shows that fame is to be earned, not bestowed by reality television. My one ultimate point of respect for skaters (though I've never been one) is that you have to fall down a fuck of alot to be any good. That takes, as Tony's dad says "balls" and "heart."
This movie goes through the trouble of showing in the beginning that they had to fight for it. Their skill was not an act of God, but them taking their talent and pushing it for all that it was worth. Even better, they skip out on the whole every-man-for-himself theme, and you can see Tony, Jay and Stacy pushing against each other, improving against each other, challenging one another to be the best. There is tension, and their ties to one another break, but deep down, they are still united by the sport and by the competition.
I just, I fucking love a movie that shows cause and effect, not just a bullshit shortcut to what every American should be dreaming of. You want a pile of money? Go fucking earn it, instead of embarrassing yourself on TV.
It's tough to watch the middle of the movie, to see them all unravel in their own ways. Because, after the first half-hour, you know this isn't some Hollywood bullshit, that even if there is a happy ending, these guys are gonna be wearing their scars when the credits roll. There are no happy endings in real life, because real life is not shot out-of-sequence. Experience happens and the damage is done. You can't just hug and forget it, and they don't. They wear their scars (actually literally in this film) and they do their best to act in accordance with their feelings.
Lords of Dogtown is a great fucking movie and I don't even give a shit about skating. There is no doubt in my mind, that had this movie been written by anyone other than one of the guys who lived it (Stacy) it would've been just another Hollywood abortion.
Movies like this make me proud and happy to be alive. But, for the most part I hate American society so much that I can't even sit still. I don't drink and I don't watch TV for a reason. I'm living in an age where the only way to survive off of your work is to sell-out and turn your film ideas into commercials and your songs into jingles. The spirit that fueled the DIY ethic of the 80's got lost somewhere, when it became okay to sell yourself to corporate America.
I'm listening to Black Flag right now. Because those guys wrote about the same world that the Lords of Dogtown lived in and I'm angry enough for it to mean something to me.
Co-opt this motherfucker.
Brandon: You're just saying that because you love the 70's. Any movie set in the 70's has the best soundtrack to you.
Jordan: Holy shit! That's "Long Way to Go" by Alice Cooper! This movie has the best soundtrack ever!!!
Brandon: See my previous comment.
ThePants and I saw Lords of Dogtown tonight on aoife's recommendation. And, for the record, it does have the best soundtrack ever:
Jimi Hendrix "Voodoo Chile" and "Fire"
Deep Purple "Space Truckin'"
The Stooges "Loose" and "T.V. Eye"
Alice Cooper "Long Way to Go"
Nazareth "Hair of the Dog"
David Bowie "Suffragette City"
Rise Against! performing "Nervous Breakdown" by Black Flag
Rot Stewart "Maggie May"
Mike Ness performing "Death or Glory" by The Clash
If that line-up doesn't appeal to you, then I can do nothing to help you. Aside from the glorious soundtrack, which was so good, that I would've watched a blank screen for two hours if they promised to play it, the movie was also great. Here, is my half-assed review with accompanying social commentary. Enjoy:
Leaving the theater, I saw a movie poster for the new Martin Lawrence movie where he is a highschool basketball coach or some nonsense and I was reminded of the character of Dominique Francon in The Fountainhead; and her aversion to living in a world that could produce work of great quality and work of utter, unremarkable shit -- and of living in a society that very often, could not tell the difference.
Lords of Dogtown is one of those movies that has the guts to admit it's about real people, living real lives. I know it's based on a true story and real people and all of that, but it's not always that obvious in movies. Not many movies would have the skillfulness to show Jay and Tony's home lives as an explanation for the decisions they made. Nor would they have the craft to intuition to contrast this against Stacy's decisions.
A crew of street kids are not treated as a bunch of vandals, drinking and fucking and doing drugs with reckless abandon because they are cool and it's edgy... they are treated as they are, kids with no guidance turning to each other for support and to the older surfers like Skip for "parental" guidance. Stacy (the writer) and Catherine (the director) really nail that intimate connection between the older and the younger crew; that sense that the younger need to prove themselves to fit in with the older, but that the older look out for the younger and protect them.
Not to take anything away from what was an excellent performance by Heath Ledger, but he was obviously instructed to play the part as if his character were Val Kilmer's Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's The Doors.
Of course, it all comes crashing to pieces as soon as big money is involved.
But, unlike many movies, and certainly going full-tilt against the zeitgeist, this story shows that fame is to be earned, not bestowed by reality television. My one ultimate point of respect for skaters (though I've never been one) is that you have to fall down a fuck of alot to be any good. That takes, as Tony's dad says "balls" and "heart."
This movie goes through the trouble of showing in the beginning that they had to fight for it. Their skill was not an act of God, but them taking their talent and pushing it for all that it was worth. Even better, they skip out on the whole every-man-for-himself theme, and you can see Tony, Jay and Stacy pushing against each other, improving against each other, challenging one another to be the best. There is tension, and their ties to one another break, but deep down, they are still united by the sport and by the competition.
I just, I fucking love a movie that shows cause and effect, not just a bullshit shortcut to what every American should be dreaming of. You want a pile of money? Go fucking earn it, instead of embarrassing yourself on TV.
It's tough to watch the middle of the movie, to see them all unravel in their own ways. Because, after the first half-hour, you know this isn't some Hollywood bullshit, that even if there is a happy ending, these guys are gonna be wearing their scars when the credits roll. There are no happy endings in real life, because real life is not shot out-of-sequence. Experience happens and the damage is done. You can't just hug and forget it, and they don't. They wear their scars (actually literally in this film) and they do their best to act in accordance with their feelings.
Lords of Dogtown is a great fucking movie and I don't even give a shit about skating. There is no doubt in my mind, that had this movie been written by anyone other than one of the guys who lived it (Stacy) it would've been just another Hollywood abortion.
Movies like this make me proud and happy to be alive. But, for the most part I hate American society so much that I can't even sit still. I don't drink and I don't watch TV for a reason. I'm living in an age where the only way to survive off of your work is to sell-out and turn your film ideas into commercials and your songs into jingles. The spirit that fueled the DIY ethic of the 80's got lost somewhere, when it became okay to sell yourself to corporate America.
I'm listening to Black Flag right now. Because those guys wrote about the same world that the Lords of Dogtown lived in and I'm angry enough for it to mean something to me.
Co-opt this motherfucker.
VIEW 11 of 11 COMMENTS
i'm sure between the two of us we can bev compelling enough to influence the pants's culinary repitoire.
I do give a shit about skating, but even if I didn't that movie would've kicked a large amount of ass.