On any given day you can find many kids (and kids at heart) skating in the Ballard skate bowl. Just last month there was a skateboarding showdown at the bowl. It’s obviously a popular sport and so are the movies about it, which got the wheels turning for a new film festival debuting in Seattle next weekend.
Just about a year ago, Ballardite Kirk Wimberley came up with the idea for The Skateboard Film Festival, appropriately named since it’s a festival dedicated to films about skateboarding. “Lately, skateboard films have become more than just a series of pros doing tricks – some people call those “trick-to-trick pornos,” Wimberley says. Last fall he hatched this idea with fellow skateboarder Eric Burgess and they began planning. “We created The Skateboard Film Festival to encourage networking within the skateboarding community and to create opportunities for filmmakers that wouldn’t otherwise exist.” The hope is that this festival will draw attention to up-and-coming film makers.
Forty films will be screened during next weekend’s inaugural festival ranging in length from two to 90 minutes. Films were submitted from around the world. “We were surprised by all the international submissions this first year. We did not expect to get so many,” Wimberley says, “And the French! The French filmmakers submitted the most films out of any country to the festival. We are amazed at their creativity, which made us want to hop the first flight out of the U.S. to skate the streets of Paris.” More information on the festival and ticket details can be found here.
Ballardite to debut gnarly film festival
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This is fantastic! Congratz!
(and Beth Williamson Miller and the chamber can choke on the remnants of the old skatebowl and their attempts to block this one)
amazing. back when i was skating (88-95) and before falling down meant not being able to get back up anymore, I never had the options kids have nowadays. Building a launch ramp to use at the end of the carport before you hit the gravel driveway in Bothell was about the best skatepark i could imagine. i am pretty jealous of the kids these days. Skateboarding was probably the only thing that kept me from sitting around, drinking, smoking pot and doing nothing with my life when i was a teenager (i saved that for being an adult). You get obsessed with it. Girls always knew they were second to skating. My family knew some shoe-goo to fix my vans, some WD40 for my bearings and a little dough to occasionally buy a new board was all i needed to be happy. I think i am going to go skating now. I miss my Eric Dressen board…
Gnarly. You just had to put that in, didn't you? I can hear you giggling way over here! ;-)
What a waste of time.
Get a job.
You'd be surprised at the number of people making a living off of skateboarding and snowboarding. I'm not just talking about the professional athlete either, it's a huge industry and employs a surprisingly large number of people even here in Seattle.
Those repairing the damage caused by skateboarders and the medical professionals that treat them need also be included.
They want to play at a park, fine, but stay off private property and off the public roads and sidewalks as they are a menace.
The “menace” quotient probably depends on the individual skateboarder. Much like whether or not automobile drivers are a menace. Some clearly are.
Painting with such a broad brush seems unduly antagonistic.
wow – pretty narrow of thought. You know that 35 year-old guy with all the tats teaching his kid how to skateboard? He's a Microsoft programmer working from home make $72.00 an hour.
Get a job.