Film
Minding the Gap
Bing Liu's documentary follows three young skateboarders in Rockford, Illinois as they navigate the wreckage of their pasts and the uncertain futures of their twenties. It's intimate and unflinching—less about skateboarding than about how friendship becomes survival when family fails you. Quietly devastating, genuinely funny, and impossibly tender.
Should you watch it?
Watch it if you like documentaries that let the filmmaker stand inside the story, turning a camera on his own friends and his own past until the form itself becomes a question about growing up.
Skip it if you need a tidy arc and a steady pace; this one drifts through skateboarding footage and loose hangouts, and its emotional weight arrives slowly and unevenly.
What it asks of you: Ninety-three minutes that linger in scenes longer than you expect, and meaning accrues sideways instead of arriving as a clean statement.
Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.
If you liked this
Hoop Dreams1994
A landmark doc that follows two basketball players across two decades, capturing how sport becomes a container for class, race, and impossible hopes. Essential viewing that mirrors Liu's patient, intimate approach.
But At three and a quarter hours, it demands serious commitment. The pacing is deliberately slow—this isn't entertainment shaped for speed.
American Animals2018
A heist film that keeps stopping to ask who these men really are, blending narrative reconstruction with documentary interviews. Same year as Minding the Gap; same hunger to understand what drives people.
But The stylistic switching between dramatization and interview can feel mannered. Some find it pretentious rather than illuminating.
The Last Black Man in San Francisco2019
A meditation on friendship, home, and what you owe each other when everything else is falling apart. Shot like poetry, acted like truth. Grief that doesn't perform, just sits with you.
But Slow-moving and oblique. If you want plot momentum or clear answers, this will frustrate you.
Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Minding the Gap
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution2020
Both are generational documents about people forging identity and solidarity outside institutions that failed them. The skate scene and the disability movement are both ways of saying: we exist on our own terms.
A documentary about disability activism that starts as a summer camp story and becomes a civil rights history. Shot across decades with archival material, it's both intimate and epic. A proper movement film, not a tragedy narrative.
But Requires patience with slower first half. Some accessibility barriers in how it's shot, which is a complicated irony for a film about disability.
More like this (8)
Boys State2020
Documentary following four high schoolers through a mock government competition. It's funny and propulsive, but it's really about ambition, masculinity, and what these kids inherit from the world around them.
But Less emotionally raw than Minding the Gap. Some scenes feel like they're performing for the camera rather than being honest with it.
The Farewell2019
A family story about duty, deception, and what you owe people you love. Comedy and heartbreak braided together. Lulu Wang captures something true about how families survive each other.
But The emotional registers shift quickly—tonal whiplash works for some viewers and alienates others.
First Reformed2018
Paul Schrader's portrait of a man at the edge, filmed almost entirely in close spaces. About crisis, faith, and what happens when you can't save anyone—not even yourself. Quietly devastating.
But Extremely bleak and interior. Very slow. Ethan Hawke's character is nearly impossible to like, which is the point but not always forgiving.
Eighth Grade2018
Bo Burnham's doc-like narrative debut follows a thirteen-year-old through the wreckage of anxiety and self-doubt. The small moments are crushing. It understands young people without romanticizing or pitying them.
But Painfully awkward by design—watching it can feel like emotional exposure therapy. Not restful.
Searching2018
A thriller told almost entirely through screens—laptop, phone, video call. But it's really about a father trying to know his daughter, which means trying to understand what you've missed. Surprisingly moving.
But The conceit is gimmicky and can feel distancing. The emotional beats hit hardest if you care about the relationship, which takes time to build.
The Florida Project2017
Sean Baker's film follows children living in cheap motels, shot in bright, unsentimental color. It's about childhood resilience and adult desperation. Funny and gutting in equal measure.
But Narratively loose. There's no clear arc or resolution—it ends where it finds you, which some find frustrating.
Boyhood2014
Like Minding the Gap, it's a portrait of male friendship across a decade. But where Liu's film faces trauma directly, Linklater's avoids it almost entirely—two opposite ways of capturing the same passage of time.
Richard Linklater filmed the same boy and his friends across twelve years of real time. It's about the texture of growing up—the small accumulations, not the big moments. Conversation and presence as subject matter.
But Three and a half hours of life unfolding at life's pace. Many find it boring rather than meditative. Requires surrender to slowness.
Grizzly Man2005
Both films are interested in how young men escape into a consuming passion—skateboarding, bears—as a way to survive unsurvivable childhoods. Both ask whether connection to the natural world can substitute for human love.
Werner Herzog's documentary about Timothy Treadwell, who lived among bears and was killed by one. It's ostensibly about nature, but it's really an essay on obsession, alienation, and the things people do to escape human connection.
But Difficult subject matter including footage of real death. Herzog's narration is sometimes so literary it dominates the material. Not a comfortable watch.
People
Cast
Keire JohnsonSelf
Zack MulliganSelf
Bing LiuSelf- Nina BowgrenSelf
- Mengyue BolenSelf
Directing
- Bing LiuDirector
Production
- Betsy SteinbergExecutive Producer
- Gordon QuinnExecutive Producer
- Justine NaganExecutive Producer
- Sally Jo FiferExecutive Producer
- Steve JamesExecutive Producer
- Bing LiuProducer
- Diane Moy QuonProducer
Recommended by
Prophet's Prey, Dogtown and Z-Boys, Dark Days, Village at the End of the World, Virgin Tales, Broke, Itzhak, Ballet 422, Return to Seoul, Close, An Open Book, GODSPEED, Ghost Fleet, Christmas, Again