Lords of Dogtown

Santa Monica and the Venice shoreline in the 1970s. A group of kids who gather at the Zephyr shop carry surfing moves onto asphalt and rewrite skateboarding. Pools emptied by the drought give them vertical walls. Three names come forward: Tony Alva, Stacy Peralta and Jay Adams. Then come sponsorship, money and fame, and the group falls apart. Catherine Hardwicke directed. Stacy Peralta wrote the screenplay, having been one of the people it describes. Emile Hirsch plays Jay Adams, Victor Rasuk plays Tony Alva, John Robinson plays Peralta and Heath Ledger plays the shop owner Skip Engblom. Tony Hawk, Johnny Knoxville and the real Z-Boys appear in small parts. It opened on 3 June 2005 through Sony and took 13.4 million dollars against a 25 million budget. Rotten Tomatoes sits at 55 percent; the reviews were mixed but Ledger's work stood apart, with one critic finding a surprising depth of sadness in it. It gained a cult following and is now named among the best skateboarding films. A series adaptation was announced for Amazon's Freevee platform in 2021. Who it is for: viewers who like seventies subculture, skate history and Heath Ledger. Who it is not for: anyone wanting a structured story. The film conveys a period without deepening any of its three characters.