A Hollywood agent finds himself in debt to a powerful bookie. To make a fast buck, he creates a team of exceptionally talented skateboarders and enters them in a downhill race. If they win, ... Read allA Hollywood agent finds himself in debt to a powerful bookie. To make a fast buck, he creates a team of exceptionally talented skateboarders and enters them in a downhill race. If they win, they will get $20,000.A Hollywood agent finds himself in debt to a powerful bookie. To make a fast buck, he creates a team of exceptionally talented skateboarders and enters them in a downhill race. If they win, they will get $20,000.
Patricia Hitchcock
- Mrs. Harris
- (as Pat Hitchcock)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
5.4416
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Featured reviews
If you're into skating then you gotta see this
This movie is worth watching when there's skating on screen; too bad there's isn't more of it. Most of the screen time is taken up with the stupid, predictable plot, and I, too, found myself thinking that the stupid dialouge must have been improvised, plus I can't figure out how they managed to make 35mm film look so bad. Manny reminds me of the park owner from Kiss meets the Phantom, a fat loser frantically running around trying to figure out what's cool and then cash in on it. Perhaps more beer or bad behavior from the kids would improve this movie, too.
It's worth watching this just to spot Tony Alva (I can't believe he's in this turkey) and to see what skaters looked like in 1977. This movie was already a curiosity when I taped it off TV in the 80s.
It's worth watching this just to spot Tony Alva (I can't believe he's in this turkey) and to see what skaters looked like in 1977. This movie was already a curiosity when I taped it off TV in the 80s.
Pleasant enough but not great; skateboarders had talent
Manny is in debt to Sol, among others, and he has to come up with an idea to make money quickly. Earlier, he nearly ran into some kids who were skateboarding in the road. When he sees one of them outside his window, he pitches the idea of a skateboarding team to Sol, who reluctantly accepts this chance to get his money back and then some.
Manny knows nothing about skateboarding. He doesn't even realize there are already teams, and as talented as the kids are, it's hard to believe at first anyone will pay money to see them.
A number of problems get in the way of the team's success. One is the need for someone to supervise them, like a parent. So Millicent is hired. Of course, as often happens in sports movies, one of the kids thinks he is too good to follow the rules. Later, the events really look like something worth seeing.
I didn't see anything here approaching good acting, but Manny, Millicent and the kids were all easy enough to like. Manny was certainly funny because he was such a loser. And the kids certainly had talent on skateboards if nothing else. The situation was hard to believe but was executed well enough.
I seriously question any reference to this being a 'family' movie. The sound went out a number of times, and other times it sounded like words had been substituted, and while tame by today's standards, the sex talk seemed pretty frank.
If you're not looking to use your brain and if your expectations are not high, I suppose this was a pleasant enough film.
Manny knows nothing about skateboarding. He doesn't even realize there are already teams, and as talented as the kids are, it's hard to believe at first anyone will pay money to see them.
A number of problems get in the way of the team's success. One is the need for someone to supervise them, like a parent. So Millicent is hired. Of course, as often happens in sports movies, one of the kids thinks he is too good to follow the rules. Later, the events really look like something worth seeing.
I didn't see anything here approaching good acting, but Manny, Millicent and the kids were all easy enough to like. Manny was certainly funny because he was such a loser. And the kids certainly had talent on skateboards if nothing else. The situation was hard to believe but was executed well enough.
I seriously question any reference to this being a 'family' movie. The sound went out a number of times, and other times it sounded like words had been substituted, and while tame by today's standards, the sex talk seemed pretty frank.
If you're not looking to use your brain and if your expectations are not high, I suppose this was a pleasant enough film.
It is what it is, with Dog Town Skaters. (Z-Boys!)
This is actually a pretty decent movie for a B skater movie. What makes it cool is that they used a lot of real skaters! You will recognize a lot of the skaters from this movie once they start doing competitions. Even some old name brands like Sims. Plotwise it's a simple plot. Older dude who looks WAY older than 31 when he started filming this who is balding, fat and has a lot of gray in his hair. He looks about 50. The Nurse lady reminds me of a Sarah Silverman, but I am not a fan of hers, and in the main LA Wheels group you have Tony Alva. Then there is the Sims brand girl, Laura Thornhill, who I had a huge crush on even though she was almost 20 years older than I am. I saw the movie at first when I was very young, and didn't realize when it was filmed and that she was a lot older than I was.
Better than you'd think
Skateboard is the implausible but engaging story of the LA Wheels, a 'professional' team of adolescents traveling the skateboard circuit (who knew there was one?). Allen Garfield plays their mentor and manager, and he is surprisingly effective as the desperate Manny Blum who needs cash to pay off gangster Antony Carbone. Kathleen Lloyd provides a touch of class as his assistant coach and the kids of the skate team seem to be having fun. An excellent family film that goes out of its way to eschew profanity, Skateboard has a happy ending for everyone, including the hoodlum.
Great!
All that I can say is that the other guy that reviewed this movie knows nothing about the history of skateboarding. In the 1970s skateboarding was one of the greatest spectacles of the time. There were actually skateboard World Championships which drew grand crowds and the invents did include slalom(weaving in and out of cones) and downhill races... I found the other guy to be completely asinine in his reasoning. This movie has a cameo of Tony Alva of Dogtown fame. Who recently was featured in the video game Tony Hawk's American Wasteland, and the feature film Lords of Dogtown and the documentary Dogtown and Z-Boys. I would recommend this movie to anyone who loves skateboarding and its history because this is clearly a part of it...
GRADE: A+, excellent
GRADE: A+, excellent
Did you know
- TriviaLeif Garrett did all but one of his own stunts.
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Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Skateboard: The Movie
- Filming locations
- N. Cherokee Avenue at Franklin Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA(Manny starts his car and drives around corner)
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $1,318,823
- Gross worldwide
- $1,318,823
- Runtime
- 1h 37m(97 min)
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1
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