Just for Kicks and Infamy
posted by Duncan at 5:11 pm on October 1st, 2005I went to the Resfest last night and watched the sneaker flick ‘Just for Kicks’ and then the graffiti flick ‘Infamy’. Both were great but it was the former that I was most interested in.
Just for Kicks charts the athletic footwear fetish from sneakers’ early adoption by the style warriors of 1970s New York City to their status today as a de facto apparel of choice for an entire generation. It was full of interviews with the sneaker collectors, the trend setters and even the ‘stick up kids’ who used to wait outside stores in NY ready to rob the shoes from the feet of customers!.
The film is kind of saying that if it wasn’t for hip hop culture and the stars of that scene then the sneaker manufacturers would not be selling as many shoes. Well, this is of course very true now’a'days but I’m not sure if it was that true at the start, at least for me. I’ve been into sneakers for the last 20 years and when I got my first proper pair (some Ellesse tennis shoes) when I was 15 I didn’t know what hip hop was. I bought them because at school casuals were cool and I wanted to be one of them. We bought brands like Ellesse and Diadora, names that now are very commercial but then were sort after. I guess as years went on I did eventually get influenced by the advertising and music (Run DMC, Adidas and Nike, The Jordan range both spring to mind) but that wasn’t till the the late 80′s early 90′s. Back to film though, try and get to see it if you are into trainers in any way, it well worth it.
