United Skates is a documentary about the African American roller skating community that has thrived for decades right across America. The culture is uniquely linked to rap and hip-hop music as many of the groundbreaking artists from those musical genres debuted their music in skating rinks – the reason, their sound was banned from radio and TV in the 70s and 80s.
Now across America, this cultural phenomenon is threatened as rinks are closed and arbitrary rules are imposed at existing venues that seem to be prejudicial to African American people.
In this audio interview with Andrew Whiteside one of the film’s directors, Tina Brown, discusses the film:
For more on the film at the NZ International Film Festival click here.