Wassup Rockers (Larry Clark, 2005: 100 mins) 3 1/2 stars

Wassup Rockers (Larry Clark, 2005: 100 mins) 3 1/2 stars
Reviewed by Michael Benton

Larry Clark, the notorious director of Kids/Bully/Ken Park, crafts a naturalistic depiction of a group of young Latino males (one of the jokes of the film is an irate cop who keeps calling them Mexican and they reply that they are from El Salvador and Guatemala--a distinction the policeman seems ignorant of) who refuse to conform to the hip-hop culture of South Central L.A. Instead they dress in tight clothes, play punk rock music, and ride skateboards around town. This often results in conflict and violence in their neighborhood, but when they take a trip up to Beverly Hills they find out that it is just as dangerous a place for them.

This is a sketch based film, which sometimes exhibit glaring holes. I found it most difficult during the first twenty minutes, after which it picked up speed, much like a skater struggling up that big hill before the exhiliration of gliding effortlessly downward. Overall it presents one of the best depictions of skater culture since Stacey Peralta's documentary Dogtown and Z-Boys (not to be confused with the Hollywood fictional depiction) and probably one of the best fictional depictions of skaters that I have seen in a film so far (I haven't seen Larry Clark's other skater film Ken Park yet).

These are disenfranchised kids who use their skater mobility and their dont-give-a-damn attitude as access to various spaces in the city. This mobility and attitude brings them rewards (the attention of young women) and punishment (police, random violence). At its core this is a road movie... this group of South Central youths are on the go constantly and the film should be approached according to the conventions of the road movie genre--which it fulfills. It is also a depiction of young people seeking to claim their own identity in a conforming environment.

Like I said the film does become sketchy at times (and may be too wandering for those that prefer neat Holywood plots) and some of the mature subject matter could offend some... but in the aftermath of various Hollywood films attempting to glorify, in other words commercialize and trivialize, the urban skater lifestyle, its good to see a gritty one about the trials and tribulations of young skaters in an inner city environment. To add to the realism of the film all of the skaters are actual residents/skaters from South Central who were recruited to play the roles and the film is based on their real-life experiences.

Official Site of Wassup Rockers