Lords of Dogtown is a “based on a true story” story that really only has impact when you know the true story. It follows a group of surfer boys, known as the z-boys, in Venice, California in the mid-seventies. When the surf was off-season, they would skate. They began to use surf techniques in their skating and developing new tricks and ways of skating. Because of their never before seen tricks, they started dominating skate competitions, and soon they were on top of the skating world. During the drought in California, they started skating in empty pools and developed the tricks and techniques that are now common in Tony Hawk’s video games. In other words, skating as we know it was started by these boys. The film hints at this fact (announcers at skating competitions say, on more than one occasion, “I don’t even know what to call that last trick, I’ve never seen it before”) but never makes it clear. Knowing that this is where it all started, and not that these are just a group of kids who get good at something already well established – adds some weight to the film as well as purpose to a lot of its scenes.

But, of course, the film still must stand on its own. Does it do it? Sort of. On one level, everything is very well done. The picture is gritty and real, the boys are enthusiastic, and the film has a real energy to it. The soundtrack is quite possibly the best since Almost Famous, and a similar sense of excitement permeates from the film. Though I have little interest in skating and even less interest in the reckless behavior of such skaters, I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen for a second. Dogtown also offers some of the best acting you’ll see in a teen-focused film. The skating is impressive on the part of all, but Emile Hirsh has an energy too his hyperactive character that makes him unceasingly watchable. And Heath Ledger offers the best performance to the best character in the film.

On the other hand, Lords of Dogtown suffers the fatal flaw that many of its genre do. There is, inevitably, an eventual coming to terms with past behavior. After rising high in status, wealth and self-image, the story must end with a “coming down” of sorts. There must be a conclusion. The way Lords of Dogtown approaches that conclusion is both graceful and problematic.

As our three main characters, Stacy (John Robinson), Jay (Emile Hirsh) and Tony (Victor Rasuk) become well known in the world of skating, they abandon Skip (Heath Ledger), their promoter, and move on to other sponsors who are willing to pay big bucks and promise fame. Skip has hitherto been unable to pay because his faulty business skills have kept him from making the money he could have been making. The three boys separate, work for different people, and the former friends now become enemies.

At the very end, the onset of a disease among one of their friends bring the three together and they have a skate – like the good old times. There is, for a moment, the suggestion that the money and fame is behind them, that their differences are a thing of the past. They have humbled themselves and have come to their roots – skating with your friends was all it was ever really about in the first place. They have all finally realized that and have returned to it once and for all.

Or have they? The effect is deceiving. Most likely, they haven’t changed at all. They’ve matured enough that they can skate together for a moment, but they are fundamentally the same. They will soon return to their momentarily hyped lives. This is probably what will happen because it’s probably what did happen. But such a conclusion suggests that all the partying, all the destruction, all the fame and fortune hording wasn’t simply part of the story at all. Rather, it has quite clearly been glorified.

If, on the other hand, the ending is supposed to imply a change of heart. If it is supposed to conclude a trio of character arcs, then it has been terribly done, because we haven’t seen what it is that has caused the contrition if the first place. Their friend’s sickness causes temporary softening toward each other, but says nothing for their character. In the end, it appears that Lords of Dogtown is simply trying to cheat its way out of the story. This, I believe, is part of the problem of telling a true story. It’s trying to wrap up a story that can’t be wrapped up. The story is “interesting” for its historical attributes, but it’s not a good story in itself.

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