One of the best documentaries of the aughts? When we compiled a Top 25 list at the end of the past decade, among those chosen was Stacy Peralta's seminal skateboarding documentary "Dogtown and the Z Boys." if you loved that doc about the birth and evolution of modern skating in the drained swimming pools of Southern California (and you should), then you'll be more than interested in what we're calling its spiritual sequel, "The Bones Brigade: An Autobiography."
If Thrasher magazine, punk, rock, hip-hop and metal were a big part of your high school experience, as it certainly was a big part of this writer's life, then you absolutely knew who the Bones Brigade were. If the Z-Boys were the original pioneers in the 1960s, the Bones Brigade were the skateboarders of the 1980s who elevated the sport and gave skateboarding another renaissance. Famous names in the skateboarding team that rode under Stacy Peralta's Powell Peralta banner included Tony Hawk, Lance Mountain, Steve Caballero, Mike McGill, Tommy Guerrero and many, many more. If the Z-Boys were the rock stars of their day, the Bones Brigade were certainly the skateboarding idols of the eighties.
Moreover, Peralta, who went from skateboader, to entrepreneur to filmmaker (directing docs like with documentaries like '"Riding Giants" and "Crips and Bloods: Made in America"), is self-releasing the documentary on his Bones Brigade website.
“We are very excited because we're releasing Bones Brigade: An Autobiography primarily by ourselves, in a new and modern way,” Stacy Peralta said in a statement, the film’s director and mentor of the original Bones Brigade. “The only place to fully experience the film will be through our Bones Brigade web site; where myself, Tony Hawk, Steve Caballero, Lance Mountain, Mike McGill, Rodney Mullen and Tommy Guerrero will interact directly with fans. The trailer premiere, new site and free download is our way of including fans right from the start in the process of releasing the film. I hope they have fun and share it with everyone who loves skateboarding, its history and the Bones Brigade.”
No release date on when they'll reveal the entire film has been set yet, but the director did offer a free download of the most successful skateboard video of all time, “The Search For Animal Chin.” Here's our interview with Peralta out at Sundance, where the film debuted earlier this year, here's our review from Hot Docs, and here's an additional clip from the film. Trailer below.