Oski

Maybe interestingly enough, European skateboarding icon, Swedish independent filmmaker and Polar Skate Co. C.E.O. Pontus Alv once stated, as early as twelve years ago:
This kid right here in front of you, in ten years, will be an Olympic champion.
Talking about Oskar Rozenberg Hallberg a.k.a. Oski, this did turn out to be correctly prophesied (but really no more, no less than everything we’re all used to from Pontus) and this eponymous documentary film by Jonathan Lomar just so happens to capture this crucial developmental transition throughout a year-long sneak dive into Oski’s reality as it brutally morphs from the one of a simultaneously exceptional and average Swedish hardcore teenage skate rat into a more definite-looking path towards the Olympic journey. Oski seeks its escape from the way-too-common trap of selective glorification into criticism of what the filmmaker describes as the sportification of skateboarding — originally a misfit’s activity, now monetarily profitable and arguably restricted as far as in its essence by the phantasmal existence of regulatory codes. The emphasis really is equally on the leeches, and the resulting torment and temptation towards compromise, making for an inviting popular window into the practice’s most prominent dilemmas. Oski’s talent here serves as a prism to highlight what really does matter in skateboarding, and what maybe doesn’t.
