I recently re-watched this film in order to get the disgusting Scope mouthwash taste out of my mouth after recently checking out "Mid 90s". There are certain films that can be re-watched over and over for the things you missed the first time through. There are other films you watch to see if there were breadcrumbs leading up to the "twist" ending. Despite the "spot the cameo of Tony Hawk" moments, LODT is neither of those. It falls into the category of films built around the soul. All the critical reviews from 10+ years ago seem to have missed that point, expecting instead to see some great skate-narrative. This film instead gives a stream of events all connected to a spiritual center, and that is freedom.
It's in the surf shop, with the guys who abandon the board making to ride waves. It's in the driveway at night when Stacy is trying to make the team on his own. There is tragedy. There is triumph. There is even some comedy. The villian is, in true millennial form, profiteering corporations, and yet we secretly understand that the long term success that will or won't be had for the heroic doppelgangers of the actual bricklayers of modern skateboarding depends on money. And yet, despite all the money the sidekick Sid has, he can't buy himself a happy ending, nor does it look like he's so unhappy.
It sound like a lot of prosthletising, and yet it's just put in as a natural backdrop for realistic characters. Nobody feels like they have been politically engineered with a certain color skin or a certain sexual orientation to beat the audience with a stick over the head about. There are no pathetic lines about social justice, the environment, etc. And consequently as a work of storytelling, it's genuine, even if some people were disappointed by the lack of blow-by-blow in the history of skatboarding.
Also the cinematography is great. Someone in another review mentioned "shaking camera". I read that and wanted to tear my hair out. Because in the intervening 10 years, the idea of shaking the camera has come to mean jarring around the audience like they are in a washing machine spin cycle with a drunk cameraman. This film has some shake when it needs shake, and it has glide when it needs glide! The shots of the skating are great. You won't see anything like what is now common on X-games, but it's more or less period accurate tricks.
Overall this is a great film and has the perfect blend of vintage 70's window dressing and Gen-X gestalt.
It's in the surf shop, with the guys who abandon the board making to ride waves. It's in the driveway at night when Stacy is trying to make the team on his own. There is tragedy. There is triumph. There is even some comedy. The villian is, in true millennial form, profiteering corporations, and yet we secretly understand that the long term success that will or won't be had for the heroic doppelgangers of the actual bricklayers of modern skateboarding depends on money. And yet, despite all the money the sidekick Sid has, he can't buy himself a happy ending, nor does it look like he's so unhappy.
It sound like a lot of prosthletising, and yet it's just put in as a natural backdrop for realistic characters. Nobody feels like they have been politically engineered with a certain color skin or a certain sexual orientation to beat the audience with a stick over the head about. There are no pathetic lines about social justice, the environment, etc. And consequently as a work of storytelling, it's genuine, even if some people were disappointed by the lack of blow-by-blow in the history of skatboarding.
Also the cinematography is great. Someone in another review mentioned "shaking camera". I read that and wanted to tear my hair out. Because in the intervening 10 years, the idea of shaking the camera has come to mean jarring around the audience like they are in a washing machine spin cycle with a drunk cameraman. This film has some shake when it needs shake, and it has glide when it needs glide! The shots of the skating are great. You won't see anything like what is now common on X-games, but it's more or less period accurate tricks.
Overall this is a great film and has the perfect blend of vintage 70's window dressing and Gen-X gestalt.