Tuesday, September 2

Skate and Destroy: The Life of Gator

By Dave Finger
EXPN.com

Stoked: The Rise and Fall of Gator / Directed by Helen Stickler

There was a time when skateboarding as you know it did not exist. A time when there were no crooked grinds, hubba ledges, tre-flips, ollie gaps or handrails. A time when, if you were to take a collective peek into the future, at the magazines, videos, ads, shops and styles of right now, you would see a freaked-out world of street stuntery, incomprehensible and foreign. That time, my friends, is the eighties, a decade when street skating was yet to be invented.

For those who don't know, skateboarding had a boom-time during the eighties. The mainstream markets embraced the look of skateboarding — the neon, the flop-over hair, the high-tops, the checkers, the danglers and the attitude of celebrity — all powered by the vertical rad.

Stoked: The Rise and Fall of Gator uses the tragic life story of Mark "Gator" Rogowski, now serving 31 years to life in prison, as a vehicle to drive the viewer closer to that era.

The 90-minute documentary uses vintage footage, photographs and interviews to piece together a picture of what life was like for the high-profile professional skateboarder of the eighties, using Gator, one of its most infamous personalities, as the mechanism to do so.

He had the girls, the sponsors, the coverage and the persona that came along with his position of skateboard rockstar. The film examines the idea of the professional skateboarder living somewhere in between the worlds of athlete and entertainer. Gator's image was as important to his popularity as his ability, and Stoked details many of the influential skateboarding movements during his short-lived time of vert stardom.

Skateboarding embraces change and the fall of vert was inevitable. As the sport transitioned from a high-profile vert spectacle to an underground, street-driven pursuit, Gator didn't know who he was anymore. This uncertainty and anxiety changed Gator, and he reacted in 1991 by beating, raping and strangling the 21-year-old best friend of his ex-girlfriend.

Stoked takes you through the highs and the lows. It takes you to the party and slaps you with the morning after. It gives you a personal tour of skateboarding's past and sheds light on the dark years of its transformation, and the people it transformed along with it. If all you know of skateboarding is what you see today, then go buy a ticket, inform yourself and use Gator's story to find out where today came from.

For movie times and locations, check out www.stokedmovie.com.