We can't wait for 'Air Force 1: Anatomy of an Urban Legend' in its full length form to coincide with the current World Basketball Festival happenings.You know you've got it bad when you merrily watch documentaries about sports footwear. Your habit's even worse when you emerge from a viewing curiously refreshed, feeling more enthusiastic about the subject matter, cleansed of mindless blog fatigue. We were raised on 'Clothes Show' and 'Dance Energy' sneaker sightings for direct documentation of a booming fanboy culture. Nike have a habit of getting it very right, with the right level of trivia and slickness to elevate their films from determined nerddom into something with crossover appeal.
Type anything pertaining sports footwear into YouTube and be ready for page after page of gormless screengrabs leading to dullards blankly describing a shoe to you as if you've just fled a barefoot cult after a lifetime of entrapment. Even Rocky Dennis breaking down colour for the blind chick in 'Mask' was more engaging. We generally give it a wide berth. There's exceptions. The Shoe Game's interviews and some Sneakers.fr affiliated Gallic collection footage was phenomenal.
But Nike tend to create promo moving pictures that transcend the usual self-inflating guff. Their work on 'Laced's videos for with Foamposite histories, Vince Carter worship and a great Charles Barkley episode was gloriously comprehensive. The 2008 'Swoosh! Inside Nike' documentary with some rare Phil Knight interview and plenty of gems from the likes of Dan Wieden on the company's marketing evolution was very necessary too.
The Wieden+Kennedy NYC commissioned 'Sneakerheads' with heavy Jordan content, completed around 2003 is another classic. Never released due to rights issues or just the general sense of negativity that pervades throughout, whether it's irate queuers, "over it" former hoarders or a looted Rivington Club, it's brilliant. Air Rev and Emz in Packer Shoes digging out gems, a swearing cigar-munching MJ, DJ AM showing the scale of his Dunk stash and cameos from Patta's Edson and our own C-Law and Kahma makes for a great testament to the highs and lows of obsession.
Thibaut de Longeville's 2005 'Just For Kicks' had a fine potted histories, the ill motion graphics, Tommy Rebel's stacked boxes and the unearthing of Run DMC's sponsorship video. It's as good a timeline as one could create without sending the everyman into a coma. The France-only shoebox packaged edition was especially good. Mr de Longeville's work on the 2007 Air Force 1 campaign was off-the-chain too. The chapter on the individual retailers who helped cement the shoe's legend might be our favourite promo video to date.
It's natural that Thibaut was recruited, with his 360 Creative crew for a lengthier foray into the Uptown. The shoe's getting another heavy push, and this film is set for an imminent screening at NYC's Apollo, which we're hoping will be appropriately rowdy. Bobbito, Clark Kent and Udi Avshalom have proved in the aforementioned projects that they're excellent talking heads, and this will be no exception. Nike are going hard with the basketball this month, and we're fiending for more high quality sneaker documentation.
Comments (1)
Nice to see a post that wasn't just selling me stuff, CT still comes with the good stuff, this new doc seems to be mostly comprised from 2007 footage done for all the anniversary hoopla?
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