Minding the Gap

Two really good skateboarding movies came out recently. The first one I got to see, Crystal Moselle's "Skate Kitchen", functioned as a fun semi-documentary that celebrated the friendship forged between a crew of NYC girls making their own space in a predominately male sport. The second one, Bing Liu's "Minding the Gap" took a very different approach to the subject, focusing much deeper on the pain that drove a group of three Midwestern skateboarders together, and how the same wounds would continue to dictate their life both in and outside of skateboarding. Unlike Skate Kitchen, this documentary is not an easy watch. It's by no means a boring watch, as Liu constructs a very cinematic experience both visually and emotionally, but some of the life experiences that the director focuses on can be truly devastating to anyone who has ever experienced anything similar. The characters in this film are real, and you want to see each of them succeed despite the odds stacked against them. I don't want to spoil the story too much, but I will say that there's something in this movie for everyone. It's much less a skateboarding movie than it is a movie about parenthood gone wrong and finding your way in your 20's, which I'm sure a lot of people can relate to. I hope everyone gets to see this film, and I hope everyone has a box of tissues close by.

Minding the Gap follows the lives of three young men who share a passion for skating. It's not long until we find out that skating is a way for them to escape from their troubled home lives. This is such a deeply intimate documentary, made with a real yearning to show something to the world. Because of all the heart it was made with, everything captured is so enticing. Documentaries often feel like documentaries, that feels like quite an obvious thing to say but that is usually why a lot of people choose not to watch them. However, this film doesn't feel like a documentary, and the fact it is makes it very shocking and overwhelming at times because you are taken on such a moving journey. These are real people therefore everything we see is true, that's the obvious thing, but everything we see in Minding the Gap is raw and completely unfiltered and it's so special. It presents everything as it is and doesn't try to be a certain way which is the key as to why it is so captivating. You can't hate the characters because you know their struggle yet of course they are not perfect. I think that's why I'm starting to love documentaries like this: when you watch a film characters often fall into a good or bad category so you love them or hate them, of course cinema has a wide expanse and that includes characters so therefore we still love and identify with characters who have flaws or we love the villain because they're just so damn good. With documentaries however they are real people not trying to be like anyone or not trying to represent anything, therefore you cant love them or hate them you just accept them and digest what they have to show. It makes you learn more about the human experience, people in the world and that I think is so amazing. I don't like the term eye-opening really because it does sound kind of patronising, our eyes should be opened to everything really, but this film does make you think and will definitely stir up your emotions. Worth the watch just so so much.

Honestly I didn't find this sort of movie meaning skaters to be my type of documentary. But I love a great thought provoking documentary. It's brilliant and beautiful in so many ways. I totally recommend watching.

After the first 10 minutes of Minding the Gap, I began to wonder why this film was nominated for an Oscar for best Documentary. How could a skateboarding documentary made by a young filmmaker be that great? Well, I was very wrong. This film about skateboarding covered many different issues, including child abuse, drug/alcohol abuse, poverty, teen parenting, racial prejudice/stereotypes, and much more. The documentary did an extraordinary job connecting the audience to the people shown in the film and empathizing with their experiences. The film caused me to think about my life and how fortunate I have been to avoid many of the problems that the young adults in the film have faced in their life. It caused me to reflect on how life altering something like abuse can be. What I thought would be a simple documentary on skateboarding turned out to be a beautiful, thought provoking film.

I registered on the site to write this because I was hungover on a Sunday and looking for skateboarding videos/docs online. I used to skate and cannot now due to a back injury.

I expected something featuring tricks and skate videos, however I received an extremely emotional reaction to a brilliant documentary about real people living through very real issues I have had experienced. The film was made brilliantly and I have highly recommended this to my friends. People who skate and those who don't. A very well done piece. I grew up in the Midwest and knew the struggle of "when is the sidewalk good for skating" with the cabin fever of just wanting to pop an ollie outside.

Brilliant. Highly recommended, especially for anyone that broke out on a skateboard (bike, roller blades, etc) just to get outside when young. This doc is terrificly an underdog.