Nobody Knows Hollywood

Director: Stacy Peralta Year: 2001 For those who think art is at its best when it’s subversive, skateboarding pioneer Stacy Peralta has a film for you. The very idea of skateboarding and art being intertwined rubs some people the wrong way. Since its beginnings, skateboarding has been looked at derisively by a number mainstream critics, calling it anything from a passing fad, equitable to the yo-yo, at best, to criminal and gang-like, at worst. The beauty of what Peralta presents is, even as a founder of the massively popular culture it has grown into today, he doesn’t run from any of the criticism. Skateboarding was niche in the 1960’s. It did die, as fads do. It was criminal and violent in the 70’s. And in that soup, against an urban cultural backdrop with some extremely colorful characters, the Z-Boys were born in the heart of Dogtown. Dogtown is the nickname for the south of Santa Monica to lower Marina del Rey area. To understand it today, it’s best to just call i...

Opinion There is a fair amount of anger floating about from several outlets about the perceived homophobia or “gay panic” in the new Kevin Hart and Will Ferrell comedy, “Get Hard”. First, a bit of background on gay panic from the Lesbian, Gay and Transgender Bar : “ Gay and trans “panic” defense tactics ask a jury to find that a victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity is to blame for the defendant’s excessively violent reaction. The perpetrator claims that the victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity not only explain – but excuse – their loss of self-control and subsequent assault of an LGBT individual. By fully or partially acquitting the perpetrators of crimes against LGBT victims, these defenses imply that LGBT lives are worth less than others.” It’s serious stuff that absolutely should be taken seriously. To that end, Get Hard should not be lumped into gay panic. That criticism is lazy, unfair and demeans the places where gay panic should be taken seriously – as i...

Director: John Hillcoat Year: 2009 The Road is the type of film I believe I’ll only see once. While I’m attracted to and have studied many films that have to do with great physical and mental pain – 127 Hours, Castaway and Silence of the Lambs come to mind – there are others, like The Road, that simply feel like too much. That’s not a criticism of the film. I appreciate the Director John Hillcoat’s craft and bravery to tell this story this way.   It is a post-apocalyptic world with few clues about how it got that way. The Man (Viggo Mortensen’s character is never given a name) and the Woman (Charlize Theron) have a brief, picturesque life as husband and wife anticipating the birth of their first (and as it will be, only) child interrupted by what sounds like the destruction of the forest surrounding them. The forest, the fire and the darkness are just the beginning however. We are propelled some ten years later to find the Man now with a young Boy (Kodi Smit-McPhee)...

Director: Stacy Peralta Year: 2004 Size matters, courage is king and what the f*@k do these guys think they’re doing are three things that may swim in your head as you watch this epic documentary. It’s loaded with archival footage that looks like it was rescued from a series of garage sales, with amazing points of view and perspectives on what the culture of surfing has meant and how it is evolving still today. Big wave riding has played a part in many other films – from narrative bombs of the sixties like “Ride the Wild Surf” to the 1991 cult classic “Point Break”. To paddle out into a lineup of salty monsters is cinematic short hand for this dude’s a kook – and a gunslinger all rolled into one. Documentaries about big waves are plentiful, too. But in Riding Giants, Director Stacy Peralta (Dogtown and Z-Boys) puts together the history of waves in a way that shines new light on the cultural significance of those who chose to take on these epic walls of water, the fears th...