Lords of Dogtown DVD Movie Review

Lords of Dogtown DVD movie features the lives of the Zephyr team in the 1970's. These surfers transformed the face of skateboarding, and their story is rich with life. The Lords of Dogtown DVD movie focuses on the lives of Jay Adams, Tony Alva and Stacey Peralta (who wrote the script). I truly feel that anyone would enjoy this DVD movie. Skateboarding is a huge part of it, but the Lords of Dogtown DVD deals with the lives of these young people, and the struggles they actually went through.

Lords of Dogtown story starts in 1975, the year that urethane skateboard wheels were invented, the year that saw the Del Mar Nationals skateboarding competition, the year that everything hit the fan for the Zephyr team and Skip Engblom, one of the owners of the shop that sponsored them.

Lords of Dogtown DVD follows these young surfers and skaters, hitting highlights and showing their friendships and hardships. These guys came from broken homes, were thrust into the spotlight by their raw talent and style, and either sank or swam depending on their grit, merit and a lot of luck. The story should speak to anyone, whether you've ever skated or surfed or even been to California. The story is legendary, and at the same time hits something in all of us.

Lords of Dogtown DVD Movie - Leads and Legends

And as a movie, Lords of Dogtown doesn't disappoint. Catherine Hardwicke does an excellent job directing the actors, and giving the movie a gritty, street feel.

Heath Ledger pulling off a rough, arrogant, and tragic Skip Engblom. You can see that he doesn't know what he's doing, and that he pushes these kids to the extreme, but still something in the way Ledger pulls it off, something in you responds to him. Emile Hirsch plays a fun and mean Jay Adams who wants nothing more than to get his mom out of the sweatshops. John Robinson plays an awkward and innocent Stacey Peralta who's always concerned about being responsible. Victor Rasuk shows Tony Alva's rock star image perfectly, but also captures his fear of failure. Michael Angarano plays the ultra friendly and frail character called Sid - a guaranteed favorite character for most viewers.

Lords of Dogtown DVD Movie - Creative License

I enjoyed this movie a lot. The fact that Stacey Peralta wrote the screen play doubled my enjoyment - especially with how he wrote his own character. The movie is visceral, showing the good and the bad, and telling the story very close to history.

The only major deviation was in the character Sid. He wasn't actually on the Zephyr team. In the movie, you may wonder how a kid with an inner ear problem who can't even stay on his board managed to get on the team while Stacey Peralta got overlooked - that's because Sid wasn't actually on the team. He was, however, a kid with cancer who loved skateboarding and convinced his parents to empty their swimming pool and let the Zephyr team skate in it. I'm guessing that the rest of the team liked to think that he was always on the team, and that Peralta honored him by putting him on the team in the movie.

That didn't bother me - I was impressed with how much of the movie did follow history! The only real complaint I had was that the first 15 minuets or so of the movie uses what I call the "shaky cam" effect. This is where the camera seems to shake around a lot, even when focused on one person, usually to give the scene a more "real" or "gritty" feeling. This effect wasn't so bad watching the movie on DVD, instead of in the theater.

Lords of Dogtown DVD Movie - Special Features

Lords of Dogtown DVD is packed with extra features - the Unrated DVD has all the features of the PG-13 DVD, plus over 4 minuets of extra movie footage.

The Lords of Dogtown DVD also features a gag reel, Original Z-Boys commentary, plus uncensored director and cast commentary, featurettes, a music video ("Nervous Breakdown" by Rise Against), Making of Lords of Dogtown and the Pacific Ocean Park, Deleted and Extended scenes, and seriously much more. When it comes to Special Features, the Lords of Dogtown DVD is PACKED!

The Lords of Dogtown DVD is an excellent movie. Lords of Dogtown captures these young surfers turned skateboarders and what they went through - I truly think that anyone would enjoy this story, especially knowing that it holds so strongly to the real story. Throughout the movie, in fact, are little references to things that truly happened. If you've seen the Dogtown and Z-Boys documentary, or read the History of Dogtown and the Zephyr Team article, you will pick up on a pile of subtle things added to the movie. Tony Hawk even shows up, playing an astronaut!

I highly recommend the Lords of Dogtown DVD Movie. See page 2 for free Lords of Dogtown video downloads from Sony Pictures, and for a link to the Streets of Dogtown free online video game.