Throughout the history of sports, pundits have sought to connect various games to street culture (cough, basketball). However, we think this characterization is but the fevered delusion of armchair point-guards. Simply put, skateboarding is the ultimate sport of the streets. In fact, the urban landscape and the skateboard deck are so intimately conjoined that one physically relies on the existence of the other. Saturday, this symbiotic relationship will be examined via Director James Cheeks’ award-winning documentary On the Grind, which follows a multiracial group of skaters thriving and surviving in the city of Long Beach following the shooting death of Vans-sponsored skateboarder Michael K. Green, one of the city’s most promising up-and-coming talents. With the LBC’s massive river channels, urban rubble and ubiquitous police force serving as the backdrop, this film promises to give credence to the tag line, “Skateboarding isn’t some suburban sport, it’s a means of survival.”
Sat., May 15, 11 a.m., 2010
