THE FEEL FREE ARTZ GROUP
Wednesday, August 31, 2016
NEW MUSIC: Ty Dolla $ign – Zaddy
Ty Dolla $ign decides to release his brand new visual for Zaddy produced by Jahaan Sweet, Frank Dukes & Ty Dolla $ign and directed by Jay Ahn.
BIKES:
Due to make its debut at Glemseck 101, a two-wheeled celebration of gasoline and good taste in the German town of Leonberg, is the steampunk 350cc Jawa Sprint motorcycle. Designed by Berlin based Urban Motors, the bike was stripped of everything except the motor, before building an entirely new chassis from steel. The design of the alloy bodywork was a collaboration with Marvin Diehl of KRT Framework, who fashioned the metal himself. Everything is book-ended by two 23-inch alloy SM Pro rims. On the engine side, Urban Motors have installed a Jikov carb and fabricated a pair of short exhausts. With no need for lights or turn signals, the wiring’s been stripped down to the bare essentials. Weighing just under 200 pounds, this little 1964 Jawa 350 might be racing against 21st century machinery like the BMW R nineT and Triumph Thruxton R.
glamb's 2016 Fall/Winter Collection Is Filled With Camp Vibes An eclectic range that screams Americana.
Japanese label glamb recently unveiled its lookbook for the colder seasons that touts an eclectic range of soft goods and accessories. Its 2016 fall/winter lineup continues to latch onto Americana and surfwear aesthetics—boasting tees, flannels, leather jackets, parkas, cardigans, patchwork denim jeans and more. Notable pieces include sweaters with Navajo weaving, pullovers and camo vests. Take a look at the collection above and expect the line to drop soon at glamb’s official website.
Willow and Jaden Smith Share a Common Angst Against Carping Adults Nabbing a joint magazine cover for ‘Interview’ and opening up to Pharrell Williams via Q&A.
Interview‘s September issue marks the first time Willow and Jaden Smith are featured on a joint magazine cover. The Smith siblings recently posed for the acclaimed American magazine and sat down with family friend Pharrell Williams for a rather extensive Q&A. The eminent teens touched upon a breadth of topics spanning generational conflicts and even where they see themselves in the future— specifically in 10 years. As a whole, they eulogized their parents calling them their “biggest role models,” explored the possibility of retiring to the mountains when they’re much older and discussed how they feel misunderstood by some censorious adults.
Take a look at a noteworthy excerpt below and head over to Interview to read the entire piece.
Take a look at a noteworthy excerpt below and head over to Interview to read the entire piece.
PHARRELL: It’s beautiful that you guys are in such lockstep. Willow, you once said that you felt like the two of you were almost like identical twins, like you could finish each other’s thoughts. Were you guys always that close?
WILLOW: Yeah. It’s crazy, the sibling dynamic. I could’ve spent my entire childhood like, “I have to love this person.” And it becomes a chore. But our parents were never like, “You have to love them.” It was more like, “You have your life. He has his life. And when you guys want to come together, when you guys want to commune, that’s up to you.” And throughout us realizing ourselves and realizing each other, we just opened our eyes and were like, “Damn, you are the yin to my yang.” Not a lot of siblings have that opportunity, because they’re always being pushed together so much. They need their time apart in order to realize themselves and realize who they are.
PHARRELL: It seems that you’ve always been—I hate using this word—famous. You’ve always been easily recognized for what it is that you do. So do you guys separate your public and private selves?
JADEN: I think we definitely do. How people look at us in public is not how we actually are in private. It’s just that we choose not to tell everyone every- thing. Like, okay, I’m in New York right now. I’m not posting an emoji of a plane on Instagram, like, “New York.” I don’t want anyone to know that I’m here in New York. And by the time this comes out, I won’t be. We don’t like people to really know what’s happening with us or what we’re into. The only thing that we want to keep people updated with is that we want to keep the kids that are following us, the kids that are looking up to us updated on what we’re learning and what we’re thinking about life.
PHARRELL: So you do have to censor yourself on social media? Do you also regulate your usage?
WILLOW: Definitely! Even for people like us who have an awareness that’s slightly more awakened, it still takes over your mind. And you find yourself randomly going on your phone for no reason, randomly doing things. It becomes compulsive, and you have to start asking yourself, “Whoa, what is the real reason for me checking my Instagram every five minutes? What is the real reason for me posting this photo right now?” I never want to do things impulsively that have no meaning or intent, especially on social media.
PHARRELL: Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
JADEN: Gone.
WILLOW: I feel that. I see myself in the mountains somewhere in a tent cooking a squirrel. [laughs]
JADEN: Not a squirrel, Willow! Why!? Why a squirrel?
WILLOW: I don’t know! Because that’s probably going to be the only food I have.
JADEN: Nah, you’re going to be a vegetarian. You’ll be surviving off grass in the morning.
WILLOW: Hopefully. Yeah, bro! I want to retreat back to living off the land and just being in nature, experiencing life in the most pure, natural way possible.
NEW ADIDAS:
adidas Originals wraps the iconic Gazelle silhouette in pared-down pastel colorways: Ice Yellow and Unity Purple. For this latest iteration, the coveted low-top sees a suede upper, an updated split-level midsole with iced foxing (similar to the Palace x adidas Originals PALACE Pro released in May), fresh white overlays and of course, branding on its side panels that is swathed in gold. The result is undeniably a super clean, contemporary take on the ’91 model.
Expect the adidas Originals Gazelle “Iced Pack” to drop online and global retailers this September 22.
After greeting the cooler season with a myriad of NMD and Ultra Boost iterations, the Three Stripes announces a suave update to the popular ZX Flux ADV silhouette. Taking a more minimalistic approach, the off-white breathable mesh upper mounts atop the just-as-clean midsole, and rounds off the core unit with a retro-inspired outsole design and a suede makeover on the heel counter. The modified model pays homage to the Yeezy 350 Boost with an almost-identical rope lacing system, and stands out with the embossed trefoil adidas Originals’ motif on its tongue. Available with a price tag at CHF 159.9 (approximately $160 USD), place your order via Titolo.
Y-3 is releasing its QR BOOST in an awfully familiar colorway. Inspired by the ’90s classic EQT Running Support, the latest QR BOOST features a hint of green amidst a palette of gray and white. Simple curves offer this silhouette an avant-garde look, all mounted atop a BOOST sole for comfort and unparalleled support. Keep an eye out for this colorway to hit Y-3 stockists soon, such as The Good Will Out, where it’s available for approximately $400 USD.
Damian Lillard is currently on his second signature shoe with adidas and each colorway manages to tell a story. This time around his D Lillard 2 is coated in lime green throughout, reminiscent of a tennis ball and aligned with the US Open. Furthermore, during his younger days, Damian and family members would get creative at a local tennis court that wasn’t too far from his grandmother’s home in Brookfield. Staying true to its build, the adidas D Lillard 2 ditches the popular Boost Technology and goes the traditional route with a molded TPU heel that’s complemented by BOUNCE technology for elite response and support.
adidas’s D Lillard 2 “Tennis Ball” is expected to exclusively launch on August 30 for $105 USD via Foot Locker‘s NYC location on 34th Street.
RIP Gene Wilder Was a True Cult Classic and a Dreamer of Dreams A fond farewell and thank you to a true original.
2016 has added yet another beautiful name to its ever-climbing list of celebrity deaths – Gene Wilder is gone. Wilder passed away from complications he suffered from Alzheimer’s disease at the age of 83, having kept his affliction a secret for the last three years of his life. Wilder’s nephew cited that the actor of screen and stage “simply couldn’t bear the idea of one less smile in the world.” He leaves behind a family, a legacy, and a filmography chock-full of classics, all of which challenged Hollywood and inspired audiences to explore the inner, infinite bounds of their imagination.
My first exposure to Gene Wilder came when I was 11 years old. I had recently been diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes and was admitted to a hospital for upwards of three weeks. I spent the first week of my stay in the sterile hallways of Moscow’s European Medical Center hooked up to IVs of saline and insulin, beeping and booping my way through ketoacidosis, unable to stomach solid food. If you can imagine anything more grim and sterile than a hospital, try a Russian hospital: stern, stone-faced nurses would try to lift my spirits as they pricked my fingers, testing my blood sugar as it slowly, sluggishly stabilized.
My father spent the entire three-week stint by my side, working and sleeping in a parallel bed, typing away vigorously at one of those blocky, black IBM ThinkPads that lawyers still use these days. Naturally, after the third day or so, my dad and I started to get stir-crazy. There is, after all, only so much conversation you can make with a sick and grumpy 11-year-old who hasn’t kept a meal down in months. Finally, my dad returned from one of his rare visits home with a haul of movies for us to watch on the hospital’s much-too-bulky TV set.
The first movie he popped into the TV’s relic of a VHS player was Young Frankenstein.
There’s a time-honored tradition of children automatically disliking everything that their parents show them as they’re growing up, only to have the truth dawn on them too late. I felt the same way about Prince a couple years later when my dad pressed play on Purple Rain. How could a lithe black man possibly shred a guitar the way my father said he could? By extension, how could a black-and-white film about Frankenstein possibly lighten me up when I was so heavy with water-weight?
The fact of the matter is that Young Frankenstein could pull laughs from a cadaver, let alone a sick kid and his father. We doubled over laughing at the misadventures of Froderick Fronkensteen, Eyegor and Fraublücher—insert horse whinny here; lines like “Put…ze candle…BACK,” “a roll in ze hay” and “nice hopping” are perennial quotables in my household, as I’m sure they are in countless families around the globe. As soon as the credits rolled on Young Frankenstein, we had two options: we could switch to Blazing Saddles or we would rewind the tape and rewatch Young Frankenstein from the top. Oftentimes, we did both.
Wilder’s career is one of cult classics: Young Frankenstein and Blazing Saddles, while beloved by comedic buffs like my dad, were far from mainstream successes. Ditto goes for Wilder’s debut in Mel Brooks’s The Producers – while Wilder did garner an Oscar nod for Best Supporting Actor, it was not until his role in Woody Allen’s Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask) that he garnered some mainstream recognition. His four films with Richard Pryor—Silver Streak, Stir Crazy, See No Evil, Hear No Evil, and Another You—are all legendary and pioneering in their own right, but far from the mainstream comedic canon. After the loss of his beloved wife, Gilda Radnor to cancer, Wilder retreated from the spotlight, focusing instead on directorial efforts and writing novels. He told reporters, “I like show but I don’t like the business.” The fact that Wilder openly derided Tim Burton’s remake of Willy Wonka and refused to see the film speaks volumes of his integrity as an artist who would not stand for shameless cash-ins.
Wilder’s performances were equal parts mad and wet-eyed. He could oscillate between these two states at a manic pace—he brought this bipolar joie de vivre to the role of Willy Wonka. Oddly enough, I don’t remember the first time I ever saw Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory. But I do remember the iconic scene that introduced the ever-elusive chocolatier. You know the one:
[Wonka] comes out of the door carrying a cane and then walks toward the crowd with a limp. After the crowd sees Willy Wonka is a cripple, they all whisper to themselves and then become deathly quiet. As I walk toward them, my cane sinks into one of the cobblestones I’m walking on and stands straight up, by itself; but I keep on walking, until I realize that I no longer have my cane. I start to fall forward, and just before I hit the ground, I do a beautiful forward somersault and bounce back up, to great applause.The fact that this entrance was entirely Wilder’s idea says a lot about his commitment and his boundless imagination: when director Mel Stuart asked him to explain his entrance, Wilder quipped, ”Because from that time on, no one will know if I’m lying or telling the truth.”
That about sums up the magic of Gene Wilder — his was a talent deeper than the page. It shined in-between lines and still stands as inspiration for today’s music-makers and dreamers of dreams, and we all should thank him for it.
Tuesday, August 30, 2016
NEW MUSIC: Young Dolph – Trappa / Usher – Missin U /
Memphis rapper Young Dolph is back with the drop of his new visual called Trappa produced by DJ Squeeky and directed by We Hard Productions.
Usher back with the drop of his new single called Missin U. Usher upcoming album Hard II Love will be in stores and Itunes on September 16th.
FRESH KICKS:
The Air Jordan 5 Returns in a "Bronze" Colorway
Slated to release next month.
Nike Air Max Zero "Persian Violet"
The iconic colorway makes its way onto another Air Max silhouette.
Nike's Air Max 90 Gets the "Cargo Khaki" Treatment
MONCLER's Peak Ankle Boots Will Have You Covered for the Colder Months
Nike Covers the High-Top Air Force 1 in Perforated Leather
The Swoosh drops one of its better non-NikeLab AF1s in recent months.
Beyoncé, Kim Kardashian and Alicia Keys Join Their Husbands for VIP Date Night After VMAs
After dominating the 2016 MTV VMAs, a crew of rap and R&B royalty convened at an afterparty to take a photo that forever raised the bar for #squadgoals!
In the early hours of Monday morning, the cozy pizzeria Pasquale Jones in Manhattan's Little Italy was transformed into the center of the celeb universe as a fleet of VMA vets arrived. The galaxy of stars included Beyoncé, husband Jay Z, Kanye and Kim Kardashian-West, Alicia Keys and husband Swizz Beatz, hip hop mogul Diddy and longtime romantic partner Cassie and Steve Stoute.
Gathered around a bottle of wine (or two…) the happy couples gathered for a truly epic epic photo.
It was a night for lots of epic moments. Beyoncé made a powerful pro-Black Lives Matter statement on the VMAs carpet, before owning the stage with a feminist-powered medley of tracks from her latest album, Lemonade.
All the Highlights from the MTV VMAs 2016
Keys also took a stand for tolerance by recognizing the 53rd anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's historic "I Have A Dream" speech. The singer also recited a poem with a powerful message: "I hope that one day, men and women truly are equal."
Kanye (who stayed with his wife at a luxurious home courtesy of AirBNB) made the most of his time in the spotlight by addressing his idols (and the Taylor Swift controversy) before premiering his new video for "Fade," featuring the lovely and talented Teyana Taylor.
A busy night called for a well deserved celebration – and no party is complete without pizza!
FILM: Trailer: Martin Lawrence: Doin’ Time: Uncut / WAR DOGS 4/5 The Dogs Of War Street.
Comedy legend Martin Lawrence returns to the stand-up stage for a night of impressions and insight on everything from sex, relationships and President Obama, to Bill Cosby, Hollywood and more. Filmed live at LA’s Orpheum Theatre.
114 Minutes. Starring: Jonah Hill, Miles Teller, Anna de Armas & Bradley Cooper. Director: Todd Phillips.
Q&A :: Justin Tipping, Director of Sneaker-Centric Coming-of-Age Film ‘Kicks’ By Kat Thompson THEHUNDREDS.COM
15-year-old Brandon is running. From what exactly, we aren’t sure. His heart is pounding, the music intensifies: “Sometimes I wish I had a spaceship—just hang out in space where it’s quiet and no one can mess with me.” So begins the trailer for Kicks, a modern coming-of-age film about a boy, his first pair of Js, and his struggles with isolation, bullying, masculinity, poverty, and loneliness.
It’s not exactly a new narrative, but one that is deeply personal to co-writer and director Justin Tipping. For his debut feature length film, set to release nationwide on September 9, Justin wanted to pay homage to his Bay Area roots, channel his experiences as an adolescent involved in the sneaker community, and begin a larger discussion surrounding societal expectations for young men. “I found it really important to at least start changing the narrative about how we can speak to the youth really and how we can get them socially engaged,” he told me over the phone as I interviewed him for The Hundreds. Justin is thoughtful and deliberate in his answers—and in his filmmaking.
Kicks recently showed at the Tribeca Film Festival, an accomplishment that was both nerve-wracking and exciting for Justin. “New York definitely fucks with Kicks,” he said of the world premiere, laughing. “Of course New York gets this.”
From conceptualizing, to casting, to attending the film festival, Justin has been able to see his directorial dream come to fruition. He’s stood by his film, adamant about telling a story revolving around marginalized communities and commodity fetishism, delivering something that is refreshingly real and distant from the whitewashed world of Hollywood. I got the chance to chat with him about the entire process, the movies that influenced him the most, and what he hopes audiences take away from Kicks. Read our conversation below.
KAT THOMPSON: What first drew you to the idea of creating a coming-of-age story that revolves around the allure and cult-like following of sneakers?
JUSTIN TIPPING: I actually had the idea back in 2009. I was studying at the American Film Institute and I was trying to figure out what my story was and what story I wanted to tell. I always look back on this time in my adolescence that I’ll never forget, which is the time I was jumped by like ten kids. That initially started because I was wearing a pair of new Nikes. That always stuck with me. I chose that, coupled with the aftermath of that experience. I was walking around school and the neighborhoods and peers were like, “Did you get a hit in?” and questioning my manhood. My brother was like, “Oh, it’s okay. You’re a man now”—trying to console me as I had two black eyes. It was that moment that was really the emotional impetus for that context.
That’s definitely the vibe I got from just watching the trailer. People will misconstrue it and say, “It’s just a movie about sneakers,” but these sneakers are a vessel to talk about hypermasculinity and toxic masculinity. Do you feel that you channeled yourself into the main character Brandon?
I definitely do. I think a lot of the anxiety I had during those awkward years—it was hard not to get into a fight or not get bullied or whatever it was… I think a lot of that was channeled into his character for sure—the internalization of all that. He walks around and raps in his head as a security blanket and I feel like lots of kids do that; maybe it was just me [laughs]. So he’s rapping these hypermasculine rap lyrics to give him new confidence. So yeah, there’s some me in there for sure.
The Bay influenced it a great deal I think. While sitting down and writing this, the Bay kind of became a character. There’s a lot of process in writing; I just kept going back to what I knew and the people I knew and the shape of their lives. Because it was this kind of journey, it was important because I felt the story there, especially the culture and hip-hop and the diversity in the Bay. I don’t know if I was aware of it growing up but looking back, it meant a lot.
I love that you say that the Bay Area is a character in itself… When was the moment you decided to become a filmmaker and how did you know that was the career for you?
It took awhile. I grew up never understanding I could be one and I never thought of it until I was around that in college. I started studying film history and cultural theory and got exposed to all these movies. That was even later in college—I didn’t even know what I was doing… but I kind of fell in love with film. You learned about the misrepresentation and underrepresentation that exists on screen and in history.
At a certain moment in time, I was like, “Wow, this is a very powerful medium. I don’t see anyone that represents me or reflects my experiences on screen; why can’t I be the one to tell that story?” So I kind of made that choice but didn’t really know how to get there. It took a few years of just working on sets and doing all kinds of random jobs in shooting and editing in film. I finally started making short films… and that solidified what I set out to do—to direct.
Yeah, representation is so important. Speaking of representation, and talking about sneaker culture, at the core of it there is very much a brotherhood and a community-oriented thing. People who are a part of that community have a lifelong obsession with footwear. Can you speak about why you chose sneaker culture as a vessel for your message and how you represented that culture in a way that is fair and accurate, seeing that it is such a niche culture?
I was kind of operating on two levels of it. There is a darker side of materialism and commodity fetishism in America for sure. The motivation could get into branding and how things can get weird with violence and hypermasculinity. It’s a Molotov mixture. But at the same time, it’s hard to pitch the story to people who know nothing about sneakers or the community. “Why does he want to get his shoes back? Why sneakers?” And that always infuriated me because—I mean, I get it because I grew up around it but a lot of people don’t understand the cultural context of what sneakers are now. They just view them as purely function.
I wanted to illustrate both those ideas and question them. At the end of the movie, I really want people to take away that there is a way to end the cycle of violence and we have to find that way. The tragic thing for me is that the kids in Kicks are born into this world—they’ve inherited this community that generations before us created. That’s not fair, but they still have to navigate all these social habits of what it means to be a man even if you’re not ready to be a man. A lot of that has to do with violence. I was definitely trying to at least start a dialogue of how do we start redefining what it means to be a man and end the cycle of violence. I don’t want to get into spoilers, but Brandon, on his quest to get the shoes back, the holy grail, he loses everything. He loses his friendship, he puts people in danger… We also have a part speaking to this outside and underdog kid who’s aware he isn’t cool and tries to do something about it by following the trends or what he thinks other people think is cool. It’s not something that we should be teaching the youth and we should definitely be conveying the idea that you can be yourself. If you like Yeezys, you like Yeezys. If you like the KDs, you like the KDs. Just do you and don’t feel pressured and go to great lengths to impress everyone else.
Yeah, you can also look at literature and it’s like, everything’s been done. I think that it’s how you do it now that matters. With hip-hop even, sometimes it’s a mashup of different genres and sampling this and sampling that… I think the term original is—I mean, you’re kind of like your influencers… You kind of just do you and let other people label you. I don’t know. I try not to think about it too much—I just try to be truthful.
So you talked about influences; what films have been the most influential personally? And what did you look towards for inspiration for Kicks?
There’s a lot [laughs]… I feel inspired by the structure and the feeling of adventure. I was like, “How can I find that feeling in Oakland?” There’s also Boyz in the Hood… And looking at Kicks, there’s definitely a lot of European influences I’d say. Andrea Arnold is this filmmaker who made this movie called Fish Tank I was watching a lot. La Haine is a ‘90s movie, French film, that’s one of my favorite films. It’s great… tonally and something that really inspired.
I was also inspired by something really abstract, but Italian Neorealism. Specifically The Bicycle Thieves—it’s this family that lost a bike and the story is that they’re trying to get their bike back. And even though it’s a world I knew nothing about, I still felt empathy towards the characters, so I was pretty fascinated with how we’re able to do that and how I could apply that to Kicks and still make it a universal story that people can understand.
What was the creative process like when you were making Kicks from start to finish? Conceptualizing it, working with the cast—how did everything go down?
It took about a year to get through a complete draft I could stand by for the script. And then once we started to work with the producers, Animal Kingdom, we had another year of developing and trying to put the financing together which is insanely difficult ‘cause it’s a very non-Hollywood film… this movie is about all people of color and the actors are largely unknown teenagers. I quickly learned it is hard to get financing for a story like this. But then Focus World picked it up and now here we are and I get people to get to see it. So shout out to Focus World for believing.
I mean, the creative process is really just absorbing as much as I could. I mean, I listened to music while I was writing. It was all kind of already there because it was so personal. It was a fun creative process… I can say it was great working with and finding the cast. That really stands out the most as far as meeting the kids and casting at local youth groups. I met one of the kids that plays Ryan, his name is Donté Clark from Richmond. He taught spoken word at the youth group and he actually shared his stories with me and that was very inspiring. He actually helped write some of the voice-over rap lyrics. It was very symbiotic in the process when I started casting the film.
It was pretty nerve-wracking [laughs]. But it was pretty incredible to experience that. It took so many years out of my life and many people’s lives to get the film made and to get to that point. Sitting in the audience and actually hearing the reaction that you hoped you would get, but weren’t sure you would get, and actually meeting and talking to people who were from the Bay or had similar experiences and having people be like, “That was amazing! I could relate to that,” or, “I went through something similar.” It was like, wow, I’m actually connecting and starting a conversation with an audience. I think that’s the most rewarding part about filmmaking. Tribeca definitely was a pretty surreal place to premiere for my first feature.
Thank you. And yeah, New York definitely fucks with it [laughs]. Like, of course New York gets this.
I noticed in the trailer that there seems to be this recurring motif of space and the astronaut and isolation. What does space symbolize in the film?
Everyone thought it was crazy to have an astronaut… For me, it functions on two levels. The first inspiration was visually. For me, there’s an association with innocence and imagination and boyhood. [There’s] this trope in boyhood storytelling, like, “What do you want to be when you grow up? An astronaut.” It kind of parallels that character’s loneliness and being an outsider and feeling like you don’t belong. Something that’s really sad about being an astronaut in the real world, hanging out, is like you’re clearly an outsider. So I kind of reflect that…
Why did this story have to be told?
Being in this weird element—like the climate in general of the country, the culture violence—it’s just really important to address it all. I found it really important to at least start changing the narrative about how we can speak to the youth really and how we can get them socially engaged. Because it’s true—you can uneducate hate, but it’s hard the older you get to uneducate that hate and anger. So, for me personally, I don’t think stories like these are told enough and I think that hopefully there’s a cultural shift to stories about marginalized groups of people… Kind of like Dope or like Boyz in the Hood; you can only point to two movies—that’s crazy! They all have a right to exist but there’s just so few movies that reflect the diversity and the culture. I think it’s important that that comes through.
I definitely looked back and thought, who did I look to when I was watching movies growing up? I didn’t watch Stand By Me and go like, “That actually looks like me.” I didn’t understand what that meant in the beginning—I liked [those movies] but it wasn’t for me. I guess that’s why this story needs to be told.
It’s not exactly a new narrative, but one that is deeply personal to co-writer and director Justin Tipping. For his debut feature length film, set to release nationwide on September 9, Justin wanted to pay homage to his Bay Area roots, channel his experiences as an adolescent involved in the sneaker community, and begin a larger discussion surrounding societal expectations for young men. “I found it really important to at least start changing the narrative about how we can speak to the youth really and how we can get them socially engaged,” he told me over the phone as I interviewed him for The Hundreds. Justin is thoughtful and deliberate in his answers—and in his filmmaking.
Kicks recently showed at the Tribeca Film Festival, an accomplishment that was both nerve-wracking and exciting for Justin. “New York definitely fucks with Kicks,” he said of the world premiere, laughing. “Of course New York gets this.”
From conceptualizing, to casting, to attending the film festival, Justin has been able to see his directorial dream come to fruition. He’s stood by his film, adamant about telling a story revolving around marginalized communities and commodity fetishism, delivering something that is refreshingly real and distant from the whitewashed world of Hollywood. I got the chance to chat with him about the entire process, the movies that influenced him the most, and what he hopes audiences take away from Kicks. Read our conversation below.
KAT THOMPSON: What first drew you to the idea of creating a coming-of-age story that revolves around the allure and cult-like following of sneakers?
JUSTIN TIPPING: I actually had the idea back in 2009. I was studying at the American Film Institute and I was trying to figure out what my story was and what story I wanted to tell. I always look back on this time in my adolescence that I’ll never forget, which is the time I was jumped by like ten kids. That initially started because I was wearing a pair of new Nikes. That always stuck with me. I chose that, coupled with the aftermath of that experience. I was walking around school and the neighborhoods and peers were like, “Did you get a hit in?” and questioning my manhood. My brother was like, “Oh, it’s okay. You’re a man now”—trying to console me as I had two black eyes. It was that moment that was really the emotional impetus for that context.
“… the Bay kind of became a character. There’s a lot of process in writing; I just kept going back to what I knew and the people I knew and the shape of their lives.”
At the same time, it made me proud, but it was also saddening. It was like, why is the idea associated with masculinity? And why do we have this societal construct where the idea of manhood is defined in very specific ways? It’s a dog-eat-dog world, or you have to get out, or the only emotion you can feel is anger—you can’t cry. So that’s kind of where I got the idea of shoe culture and that domain—and it hasn’t slowed down or stopped. That was another way to get into that idea and also comment on a problem that exists and happens everyday.That’s definitely the vibe I got from just watching the trailer. People will misconstrue it and say, “It’s just a movie about sneakers,” but these sneakers are a vessel to talk about hypermasculinity and toxic masculinity. Do you feel that you channeled yourself into the main character Brandon?
I definitely do. I think a lot of the anxiety I had during those awkward years—it was hard not to get into a fight or not get bullied or whatever it was… I think a lot of that was channeled into his character for sure—the internalization of all that. He walks around and raps in his head as a security blanket and I feel like lots of kids do that; maybe it was just me [laughs]. So he’s rapping these hypermasculine rap lyrics to give him new confidence. So yeah, there’s some me in there for sure.
Jahking Guillory plays 15-year-old Brandon. (source: youtube.com)
And you also grew up in the Bay Area right? How did your upbringing in the Bay Area influence your work or this film?The Bay influenced it a great deal I think. While sitting down and writing this, the Bay kind of became a character. There’s a lot of process in writing; I just kept going back to what I knew and the people I knew and the shape of their lives. Because it was this kind of journey, it was important because I felt the story there, especially the culture and hip-hop and the diversity in the Bay. I don’t know if I was aware of it growing up but looking back, it meant a lot.
I love that you say that the Bay Area is a character in itself… When was the moment you decided to become a filmmaker and how did you know that was the career for you?
It took awhile. I grew up never understanding I could be one and I never thought of it until I was around that in college. I started studying film history and cultural theory and got exposed to all these movies. That was even later in college—I didn’t even know what I was doing… but I kind of fell in love with film. You learned about the misrepresentation and underrepresentation that exists on screen and in history.
At a certain moment in time, I was like, “Wow, this is a very powerful medium. I don’t see anyone that represents me or reflects my experiences on screen; why can’t I be the one to tell that story?” So I kind of made that choice but didn’t really know how to get there. It took a few years of just working on sets and doing all kinds of random jobs in shooting and editing in film. I finally started making short films… and that solidified what I set out to do—to direct.
Yeah, representation is so important. Speaking of representation, and talking about sneaker culture, at the core of it there is very much a brotherhood and a community-oriented thing. People who are a part of that community have a lifelong obsession with footwear. Can you speak about why you chose sneaker culture as a vessel for your message and how you represented that culture in a way that is fair and accurate, seeing that it is such a niche culture?
I was kind of operating on two levels of it. There is a darker side of materialism and commodity fetishism in America for sure. The motivation could get into branding and how things can get weird with violence and hypermasculinity. It’s a Molotov mixture. But at the same time, it’s hard to pitch the story to people who know nothing about sneakers or the community. “Why does he want to get his shoes back? Why sneakers?” And that always infuriated me because—I mean, I get it because I grew up around it but a lot of people don’t understand the cultural context of what sneakers are now. They just view them as purely function.
Director Justin Tipping.
A lot of reporters in the media are very condescending and dismissive when there’s a riot or a fight over shoes. They’re like, “Oh, over a pair of shoes? Who would spend money on that?” And it’s like, that’s not helping solve the problem of shoe violence. You’re making it worse and degrading and diminishing the people that view the sneakers as a piece of art, as a collectible. You can buy $2000 paintings on your wall that no one’s going to see but you, and you can buy a pair of $600 sneakers, wear them, show the world your art, and put them out your shelf and look at them. It’s like, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. A lot of people don’t understand. In some communities, Jordan represents way more than just a basketball player. It’s hip-hop, fashion, culture, and hopes and dreams. He represents this rag-to-riches story… I’m just trying to get a universal approach to it where anyone can go and empathize with why someone would want them.“I was definitely trying to at least start a dialogue of how do we start redefining what it means to be a man and end the cycle of violence.”
Absolutely. You spoke a little bit about commodity fetishism and hypermasculinity; what was the main point you wanted your audiences to take away from watching Kicks?I wanted to illustrate both those ideas and question them. At the end of the movie, I really want people to take away that there is a way to end the cycle of violence and we have to find that way. The tragic thing for me is that the kids in Kicks are born into this world—they’ve inherited this community that generations before us created. That’s not fair, but they still have to navigate all these social habits of what it means to be a man even if you’re not ready to be a man. A lot of that has to do with violence. I was definitely trying to at least start a dialogue of how do we start redefining what it means to be a man and end the cycle of violence. I don’t want to get into spoilers, but Brandon, on his quest to get the shoes back, the holy grail, he loses everything. He loses his friendship, he puts people in danger… We also have a part speaking to this outside and underdog kid who’s aware he isn’t cool and tries to do something about it by following the trends or what he thinks other people think is cool. It’s not something that we should be teaching the youth and we should definitely be conveying the idea that you can be yourself. If you like Yeezys, you like Yeezys. If you like the KDs, you like the KDs. Just do you and don’t feel pressured and go to great lengths to impress everyone else.
The cast of Kicks.
And you mentioned it’s a quest story—the Holy Grail type of thing. It makes me think about Chris Booker and The Seven Basic Plots; it’s a book that talks about how there’s only seven plots in the world and we keep retelling reiterations of the same story over and over again. So, as a storyteller, how do you keep Kicks feeling like a fresh story when there’s only so many plots to be told?Yeah, you can also look at literature and it’s like, everything’s been done. I think that it’s how you do it now that matters. With hip-hop even, sometimes it’s a mashup of different genres and sampling this and sampling that… I think the term original is—I mean, you’re kind of like your influencers… You kind of just do you and let other people label you. I don’t know. I try not to think about it too much—I just try to be truthful.
So you talked about influences; what films have been the most influential personally? And what did you look towards for inspiration for Kicks?
There’s a lot [laughs]… I feel inspired by the structure and the feeling of adventure. I was like, “How can I find that feeling in Oakland?” There’s also Boyz in the Hood… And looking at Kicks, there’s definitely a lot of European influences I’d say. Andrea Arnold is this filmmaker who made this movie called Fish Tank I was watching a lot. La Haine is a ‘90s movie, French film, that’s one of my favorite films. It’s great… tonally and something that really inspired.
I was also inspired by something really abstract, but Italian Neorealism. Specifically The Bicycle Thieves—it’s this family that lost a bike and the story is that they’re trying to get their bike back. And even though it’s a world I knew nothing about, I still felt empathy towards the characters, so I was pretty fascinated with how we’re able to do that and how I could apply that to Kicks and still make it a universal story that people can understand.
What was the creative process like when you were making Kicks from start to finish? Conceptualizing it, working with the cast—how did everything go down?
It took about a year to get through a complete draft I could stand by for the script. And then once we started to work with the producers, Animal Kingdom, we had another year of developing and trying to put the financing together which is insanely difficult ‘cause it’s a very non-Hollywood film… this movie is about all people of color and the actors are largely unknown teenagers. I quickly learned it is hard to get financing for a story like this. But then Focus World picked it up and now here we are and I get people to get to see it. So shout out to Focus World for believing.
I mean, the creative process is really just absorbing as much as I could. I mean, I listened to music while I was writing. It was all kind of already there because it was so personal. It was a fun creative process… I can say it was great working with and finding the cast. That really stands out the most as far as meeting the kids and casting at local youth groups. I met one of the kids that plays Ryan, his name is Donté Clark from Richmond. He taught spoken word at the youth group and he actually shared his stories with me and that was very inspiring. He actually helped write some of the voice-over rap lyrics. It was very symbiotic in the process when I started casting the film.
(source: youtube.com)
What was it like when the film was completed and showing it at Tribeca? How was that experience?It was pretty nerve-wracking [laughs]. But it was pretty incredible to experience that. It took so many years out of my life and many people’s lives to get the film made and to get to that point. Sitting in the audience and actually hearing the reaction that you hoped you would get, but weren’t sure you would get, and actually meeting and talking to people who were from the Bay or had similar experiences and having people be like, “That was amazing! I could relate to that,” or, “I went through something similar.” It was like, wow, I’m actually connecting and starting a conversation with an audience. I think that’s the most rewarding part about filmmaking. Tribeca definitely was a pretty surreal place to premiere for my first feature.
“Because it’s true—you can uneducate hate, but it’s hard the older you get to uneducate that hate and anger.”
Yeah, congratulations, by the way! That’s huge. And I think with what you were saying about it being all people of color in the cast and it not being a stereotypical Hollywood film—that’s huge and it’s representative.Thank you. And yeah, New York definitely fucks with it [laughs]. Like, of course New York gets this.
I noticed in the trailer that there seems to be this recurring motif of space and the astronaut and isolation. What does space symbolize in the film?
Everyone thought it was crazy to have an astronaut… For me, it functions on two levels. The first inspiration was visually. For me, there’s an association with innocence and imagination and boyhood. [There’s] this trope in boyhood storytelling, like, “What do you want to be when you grow up? An astronaut.” It kind of parallels that character’s loneliness and being an outsider and feeling like you don’t belong. Something that’s really sad about being an astronaut in the real world, hanging out, is like you’re clearly an outsider. So I kind of reflect that…
(source: youtube.com)
There’s [also] some weird space in hip-hop where [space and hip-hop] converge. Lil Wayne made the Space Jam Martian mixtape and Pharrell has BBC with the astronaut logo. I look back on it now and maybe I was just stimulated by astronauts and hip-hop? I don’t know. But, metaphorically in the story, a lot of people have actually had different interpretations and so I’m like, “If you interpreted it your way, take it, save that.” But to me, it was another a metaphor for machismo or this idea for him to become a man. He kind of starts off as this guardian angel first, after these big moments of decision that the character makes. And because it’s the idea of being a man is flawed, it’s bringing back a darker past. It’s definitely a metaphor; hopefully it’s effective.Why did this story have to be told?
Being in this weird element—like the climate in general of the country, the culture violence—it’s just really important to address it all. I found it really important to at least start changing the narrative about how we can speak to the youth really and how we can get them socially engaged. Because it’s true—you can uneducate hate, but it’s hard the older you get to uneducate that hate and anger. So, for me personally, I don’t think stories like these are told enough and I think that hopefully there’s a cultural shift to stories about marginalized groups of people… Kind of like Dope or like Boyz in the Hood; you can only point to two movies—that’s crazy! They all have a right to exist but there’s just so few movies that reflect the diversity and the culture. I think it’s important that that comes through.
I definitely looked back and thought, who did I look to when I was watching movies growing up? I didn’t watch Stand By Me and go like, “That actually looks like me.” I didn’t understand what that meant in the beginning—I liked [those movies] but it wasn’t for me. I guess that’s why this story needs to be told.
***
Catch our private screening of Kicks tomorrow, August 25, in San Francisco. Find out how to RSVP and receive a free gift bag from The Hundreds San Francisco with your ticket stub here.
Kicks is to release nationwide on September 9. Follow Justin Tipping on Twitter @JustinTipping and Instagram @Jtip.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
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