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Baseball, Sports

Point-counterpoint: Mets hire Brodie Van Wagenen as GM

by Mitch Bannon, Alden Tabac on

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The New York Mets hired Brodie Van Wagenen, a former agent and co-head of the baseball division at the Creative Artists Agency, to be their new general manager. Will his lack of front office experience and background as an agent pay off or fail him?

Brodie Van Wagenen will prove his critics wrong

Alden Tabac

The process of hiring a general manager has traditionally focused on front office experience. Most of today’s GMs have worked their way up from lower positions in a professional sporting organization. Brodie Van Wagenen’s experience as an agent brings unique qualities to the job that other GMs who have followed the typical path do not have. His time as a player agent representing Mets stars Yoenis Céspedes, Todd Frazier, and Jacob deGrom gives him a personal connection with three of the team’s leaders. Moreover, Van Wagenen got to understand the general manager position from the other side of the conference table, from his several successful negotiations with current GMs. His well-rounded understanding of player and front office dialogue gives him the advantage of being a more shrewd negotiator than GMs of other teams.

Van Wagenen is a progressive thinker who has used sabermetrics to assist clients in signing lucrative contracts: Before entering negotiations with the Mets to sign Céspedes, Van Wagenen used analytics to find Céspedes’ monetary value based on the revenues he produced on and off the field. With similar methods, the new GM can find players with the best dollar-per-production value and field a team whose performance matches its payroll.

Sports teams that have strayed from traditional methods have reaped the rewards. For example, the current Golden State Warriors dynasty was built by agent-turned-GM Bob Myers, and, without any previous managerial experience, New York Yankees manager Aaron Boone just led his team to a 100-win season. Although Van Wagenen cannot get the Mets to a World Series next season, his critics will come around to his hiring.

Mets Strike Out On General Manager Hire

Mitch Bannon

Brodie Van Wagenen’s ‘crossing the aisle’ to become a GM poses obvious dilemmas even though the Mets claim that there are provisions in Van Wagenen’s contract to deal with potential conflicts of interest. As an agent, he worked for several of his new employees, including pitcher Jacob deGrom, outfielder Yoenis Céspedes, and quarterback-turned-baseball-prospect Tim Tebow. Now employing the players he once represented and advocated for, it’s unclear whether he can move past his personal relationships with those players and act in the best interest of the franchise.

Agents are privy to all sorts of information. For example, with critical contract negotiations coming up for DeGrom, there are worries that Van Wagenen could exploit this information. All corners of the industry have noticed the potential problems Van Wagenen’s appointment may cause. Players Association Executive Director Tony Clark noted the many calls and texts of concern he has received following Van Wagenen’s hiring. Agent Scott Boras underscored the importance of an agent’s commitment to their clients, insinuating that Van Wagenen’s former Mets clients could feel betrayed depending on his actions as GM.

Van Wagenen may scout and manage talent well, but previous sports agents’ attempts to hold one of baseball’s most coveted positions have gone poorly. Most recently, the hiring of Dave Stewart—a former player and agent—resulted in some of the worst personnel moves in Arizona Diamondbacks history, and he was fired two years later.

Beyond the controversy surrounding his past profession, Van Wagenen’s incompetencies are already showing. He claimed the lowly 77-win Mets—and their bottom five farm system—can avoid a rebuild. With ample dissention and no sign of competent managerial practice to compensate, the Mets will need a miracle to save themselves from wasting the primes of Jacob DeGrom, Noah Syndergaard, and even Tim Tebow.

Editors’ pick

It is a savvy hire. Van Wagenen got to this position by way of his acumen in baseball and business. The salesmanship abilities he developed as agent will be put to good use, and he has a headstart on getting his former clients to buy in to the role change.

 

Science & Technology

Myers-Briggs’ evolution into the personality gospel

by Morgan Sweeney on

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“Throughout college, I was always someone who thought that who you were was a function of what you accomplished,” Merve Emre, associate professor of English at the University of Oxford and author of the book The Personality Brokers, said.

Emre, a former assistant professor at McGill, is not alone in thinking this. Her new book tells the story of the mother-daughter duo Katharine Cook Briggs and Isabel Briggs Myers, and revolutionized the tendency to quantify a person’s value as a function of their productivity. Personality testing rose in popularity in twentieth-century America as the perfect tool to categorize people in an increasingly-specialized, newly-industrialized society. Defining people’s identities in the context of their work had the additional benefit of motivating them to work harder for the illusion of self-fulfillment. Unaccredited psychological associations manufactured test after test, and people were assessed, measured, and hired or fired based on their results.

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) stood out from other tests since there were no wrong answers to the assessment; the different results simply indicated different types of people who could use their skills in unique ways. The creation of a user-friendly test that asked everyday questions such as, “Are you generally: (a) a ‘good mixer;’ or (b) rather reserved in company?” transformed the Indicator into a multimillion dollar industry.  

“What’s so interesting to me about the language of the Type Indicator is that it doesn’t care about what you’ve accomplished, it tells you ‘here is who you are,’” Emre said. “The Indicator promises people a story about themselves [….It] offers a sort of unthreatening form of self-discovery in which all types are created equal.”

In The Personality Brokers, Emre integrates elements of the personal and political into the captivating story of the two protagonists who created the inventory. As two women with no formal psychological training, Myers and Briggs serve in stark contrast to other psychologists of the early 20th century; however, their fierce devotion to the gospel of personality revolutionized psychological assessment.

The book begins with Briggs: An intelligent and scientifically-minded mother whose dedication to homemaking was surpassed only by her obsession with Carl Jung, the Freudian disciple whose theories of analytic psychology would later form the basis of the MBTI. Her daughter, Isabel Briggs Myers, grew up under her mother’s tutelage and carried her infatuation with analytical psychology into her late 80s, working tirelessly to create a way for the public to use her mother’s Jungian teachings.

Isabel considered each of Jung’s three pairs of personality qualities: Introversion (I) and Extraversion (E), Intuition (N) and Sensing (S), Thinking (T) and Feeling (F), with an additional pair her mother had come up with: Judging (J) and Perceiving (P). The theory goes that each person favoured one trait in each pair, and the four letters would combine to form their personality ‘type,’ which corresponded to a certain way of looking at the world. Isabel started out surveying people she knew, asking questions, and noting their preferences. The scope of her investigation grew as she drove across the U.S. to survey others, obtaining data from businesses, schools, and hospitals, before finally compiling it all in the MBTI. Isabel had to fight hard to get her Indicator published and distributed, as its unscientific premise was initially rejected by multiple psychometric companies.

Although the MBTI remains controversial in academia, Isabel’s efforts were rewarded; people from Fortune 500 companies, schools, and various workplaces continue to emphatically assert that her indicator has helped them better understand themselves. For those interested in developing a more comprehensive view of their personality, variations of the Myers-Briggs assessment can be found for free online. Alternatively, it costs $50 to take the actual Myers-Briggs personality assessment.

Art, Arts & Entertainment

Station 16 fuses live performance and satirical graphics

by Keira Seidenberg on

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 n Station 16’s current exhibition, Near Mint, Montreal-based artists Jason Wasserman and Eric Clement showcase a range of prints, drawings, and hanging sculptures that touch on themes of nostalgia and commercialism. The show falls somewhere between browsing through Pinterest for tattoo inspiration—displayed works include floral patterns and semi-naked women painted on the walls—and flipping through a ‘60s home decor magazine. In addition to the static artwork on display, the exhibition’s vernissage, held on Oct. 25, featured live tattooing from Jeremy Shantz—a detail that lent the event an almost oversaturated Plateau-hipster vibe.

Wasserman’s style is striking for its grayscale imagery and dystopic, dreamscape quality. A Montreal native, Wasserman attributes much of his comic-book-meets-street-art style to the graphic novels that he read as a child, a passion that led him to pursue a BFA at Concordia University. While a portion of Wasserman’s work is on display at the Station 16 gallery, most exists for public-viewing on the streets of Montreal, including sidewalk paintings of elephants and commissioned interior works in restaurants like Foeigwa and Cadence Cycle.

The work of Wasserman’s contemporary Eric Clement is equally engaging, and showcases consumable everyday products. Reminiscent of Andy Warhol’s Campbell Soup and Brillo Pad prints, which were revolutionary for their contribution to the Pop Art movement and criticism of consumer culture, Wasserman’s paintings depict commodities such as insect repellent and match boxes with minor changes to their appearance. Clement speaks to the attentive viewer by altering brands’ marketing, inserting satirical phrases like “keep your gram lit Photoflash” and “Hater Raid Spray for Rats, Snakes, and Snitches.” At first glance, his products appear as though they might appear on grocery store shelves, but closer inspection reveals Clement’s satire.

The work on display in Near Mint is both comforting and unsettling. Many of Wasserman’s works evoke stock tattoo imagery, juxtaposing jarring images like a barber shop beside drawings of rats clawing their way out of jars. Against Wasserman’s intricate patterning, Clement’s paintings of single products on simple backgrounds appear preternaturally fixed, a material calm amidst the tumult of Wasserman’s illustrative imagination. While the live tattooing might prompt a slight eye roll upon entrance, it fostered a sense of cohesion between the live action work and the framed pieces on the wall, suggesting a corporeal enactment of the static drawings.

Despite the small space and expected crowd of artsy exhibition-goers rife with tiny bangs and rolled-up hats, the exhibition was refreshing for its engagement with local artists. With a nod to their background as street artists, Wasserman and Clement’s work transformed the small gallery space into a quasi-urban environment, reframing a street art aesthetic within a gallery context. While the gallery world is notorious for its restrictive definition of art, Station 16 surpasses traditional limitations. Art can be anything: Even the contents of your mother’s spice rack or a grumbling hipster getting tattooed in real time.

 

Science & Technology

T-cells take the wheel

by Margaret Wdowiak on

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In recent years, modern targeted cancer treatments such as chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery have become better at effectively treating the disease. However, these methods continue to be invasive for patients, as they essentially involve  racing to kill cancerous cells faster than healthy ones. Fortunately, discoveries in the field of immunotherapy—using the immune system for treatment—are widening the possibilities for successful cancer procedures. This year, the 2018 Nobel Prize for Medicine went to Japanese researcher Tasuku Honjo and American researcher James Allison for their groundbreaking development in immunotherapies, which show promising results in the fight against cancer.     

Fundamentally, cancer is a disease of cells. The genes inside a cell control its growth, division, and death. However, sometimes cells ignore these signals and multiply at a facer rate than normal, potentially resulting in cancerous tumours.

Honjo and Allison’s research largely concerns T-cells, which are white blood cells that play a key role in the immune system by recognizing and destroying abnormal cells, such as the ones that spread cancer. There are a variety of T-cell types including ‘cytotoxic T-cells,’ which kill tumour and virus-infected cells, and  ‘helper T-cells,’ which assist other white blood cells in performing their functions.

“Historically, [T-cells] were thought to be CD4 [helper] and CD8 [cytotoxic] in nature, but this simple classification has expanded dramatically in the last decade,” Brian Ward, associate professor in McGill’s Department of Microbiology and Immunology, wrote in an email to The McGill Tribune.

In order to trigger an immune response, all T-cells interact with a complex system of proteins that act as accelerators and brakes. This system is similar to that of a car, which can brake to stop or accelerate to go faster. T-cells can accelerate to destroy cells but also brake before they destroy healthy ones. Deformed cancerous cells spread when the T-cells either are either not acting fast enough or braking before destroying them.

The new research is the result of decades of work. In the 1990s, Allison studied the effects of a protein called CTLA-4, which acts like a brake on T-cells. He was able to develop an antibody to block the protein’s function and, with the brakes cut, T-cells can go on destroying cancer cells beyond what is normally possible.

A few years later, Honjo discovered another brake protein known as PD-1. PD-1 also inhibits T-cells but does so by preventing their activation. Honjo then developed a treatment for cancer based on PD-1 blockage.

Studies have demonstrated the incredible potential of these two novel immunotherapies; many trial patients are experiencing long-term remission and some are even cured. While the anti-PD-1 therapy has been found to be the more effective of the two, combining them has proven to be the most successful option.

“[The] field [of immunotherapy] has already radically changed cancer treatment and will, undoubtedly, change the approach to many autoimmune condition[s] as well as some infectious diseases,” Ward wrote.

In the future, immunotherapy could develop into a cure for many more illnesses than cancer. Its potential is unlimited.

Basketball, Know Your Athlete, Men's Varsity, Sports

Know Your Athlete: Alex Paquin

by Ender McDuff on

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Alex Paquin, the McGill men’s team’s fifth-year starting point guard from Candiac, Quebec, began his athletic career in a different sport: Baseball. At age seven, Paquin’s brother—who went on to play baseball in university—introduced him to basketball.

“I was playing [basketball] everywhere [after that], in the park, at home,” Paquin said. “I was just this little kid who was always playing […and] having fun.”

Eventually, Paquin chose to pursue basketball more seriously and set his sights set on playing in university. He made his way to American University, an NCAA Division 1 school in Washington, DC, where he played for three seasons.

“[Playing in the United States] was pretty cool,” Paquin said. “It’s a lot different than in Canada. The culture of sports is on another level.”

After graduating three years later, Paquin returned to Montreal to play for McGill while working towards his diploma in applied finance. He gained two more years of playing time with the move due to U Sports’ eligibility rules which allow for five years of varsity athletic participation.

Paquin has, thus far, made the most of his return to his home country: He helped the McGill men to a program-best fourth-place finish last year while earning RSEQ and U Sports Championship All-Star honours.

“At first, it was hard to adjust, […] but once I [did], it was honestly the year I loved [the] most […and] had the most fun,” Paquin said. “It was just a connection […with] their culture […of] brotherhood, working hard, and having fun doing it.”

Despite growing up as a Kobe Bryant fan, Paquin models his play most closely to Portland Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard. Paquin sees himself as a smart, tough player who is a strong shooter and a hard worker.

“I feel like I’ve eliminated most of my deficiencies [on] offence,” Paquin said. “Now, it is mostly about getting in shape.”

The biggest change Paquin has seen in his game over the years has been in his approach to the game.

“It used to be hard,” Paquin said. “I used to [think] ‘I need to score, I need to put on a lot of pressure,’ but, now […] I’m really prepared. When I come into a game, it doesn’t matter what’s in front of me. I’ll know what to do.”

Looking ahead to his final university season, Paquin has set himself lofty goals. He hopes to earn All-Canadian honours, and he wants his team to keep winning.

“Most people think that because [five graduating players] left, we’re going to have a down year, but I really want to show everyone that it doesn’t matter,” Paquin said. “They instilled [a winning attitude] at McGill, [and] we’re still going to win.”

Paquin hopes to play professionally in Europe upon graduating from McGill. That process requires finding an agent, showing off his skills in a highlight reel, and, most importantly, having a strong season.

“It’s stressful […] because there’s a lot of uncertainty,” Paquin said. “I’ve got to show up [to] every game. I can’t take a break [….] I have to perform.”

Paquin’s game has benefitted from that sort of additional pressure thus far. The point guard has averaged 19 points, three assists, and three rebounds through the eight preseason games in which he played—all improvements from his numbers last year. As the regular season tips off on Thursday, Nov. 8, Paquin will look to maintain his team’s pace and lead McGill to yet another record season.

Science & Technology

Understanding asbestos

by Sophia Gorbounov on

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Asbestos: Mid-twentieth century American houses were hopeless without it. Malcolm in the Middle made a punchline out of it in an episode. Now, buildings are being forced to remove it, and some countries—including Canada—are introducing legislation to ban it completely. This is a problem that hits close to home, since many of McGill’s historical buildings contain large quantities of the material.

The Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) building is currently under construction in part to remove asbestos. As the building is over half a century old, it was constructed when asbestos usage was at its peak. Its closure calls the threat of asbestos in other aging McGill buildings into question. The McGill Asbestos Web Database shows that many buildings on campus—including the Adams Building and Redpath Library—have areas where asbestos material content ranges from 25 to 75 per cent. Moreover, many of the reports have not been updated in nearly a decade.

Asbestos refers not to a single thing, but to a category of materials. The word ‘asbestos’ comes from Greek and means ‘unquenchable.’ By definition, asbestos is a group of naturally occurring, fibrous, silicate materials and acts as a very good insulator.

The most common form of asbestos is chrysotile, or white asbestos. In comparison to other variants, it has softer fibres, meaning that it is less dangerous to inhale as opposed to  sharp fibres, which get caught more easily in the lungs. Other types of asbestos include tremolite and brown asbestos, although they are not frequently used in commercial products. Asbestos is resitant to fire, electricity, and corrosion, making it useful as a heat-resistor and as friction control in brake linings and household insulation. Asbestos can also act in conjunction with materials such as steel or rubber to strengthen them.

The U.S. government recognizes six types of asbestos, which it categorizes into two main groups: Serpentine, which corresponds to white asbestos, and amphibole, which includes all five other recognized types. Research shows that there are more than five types amphibole asbestoses which the U.S. government does not recognize, but that exist in sizeable quantities and that can be just as toxic.

When it first came into use in the mid 20th century, asbestos was primarily used as a construction material. By the 1980s, it was used as the main fireproofing and insulating material for multi-story buildings. It was incorporated into adhesives, sealants, cement sheets, and was sprayed on walls, ceilings, and girders. Asbestos was truly the ‘miracle material’ of the construction world.

In Canada, asbestos mines constituted a large source of income. By 1966, Canada was producing over 40 per cent of the world’s white asbestos.

While it may once have been an architectural and financial miracle, asbestos has a toxic legacy. When it breaks down, fibres release into the air. These fibres pose respiratory and long-term risks not only to residents in the building, but also workers and repairmen. Tearing down an asbestos-filled building only increases the risk of releasing harmful fibres.

One of asbestos’ most lethal effects is mesothelioma, a form of cancer caused almost exclusively by long-term exposure to asbestos. The disease has a poor prognosis rate; most patients die within 21 months of diagnosis. Canada has some of the highest rates of mesothelioma in the world and asbestos is the number one cause of occupational death in the country. Yet, its use is still increasing worldwide.

Despite the existence of safe alternative materials and the health complications it causes, the desire to ban asbestos has been sluggish. In the U.S., asbestos can still be used in most materials, so long as it is in concentrations of less than one per cent. In China and India, asbestos is still regularly used in building materials.

Canada has only recently taken its first step to banning asbestos. Though the Canadian government lists it as a toxic substance, the legislation to ban it was only introduced for the first time in January of this year and still has a long way to go before implementation.

McGill, News

McGill students protest the use of the Redmen name

by Maggie Roberts on

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McGill students gathered outside the James Administration Building on Oct. 31 to demonstrate against the continued use of the ‘Redmen’ name, which is currently used by all 28 of McGill’s mens’ varsity teams. Organized by Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU)’s Indigenous Affairs Committee, the peaceful protesters chanted “Not your Redmen” and stressed the name’s racist invocation of indigeneity.

Speakers from the McGill and Montreal communities took part in the demonstration, including representatives from McGill Indigenous Affairs, McGill Black Students Network (BSN), and the Native Women’s Shelter of Montreal. Abdel Dicko, the BSN’s vice-president (VP) political coordinator, spoke about his organization’s solidarity with indigenous students and expressed the organization’s support for the name change.

“We, the BSN, firmly believe that the Redmen name and the very significant weight it carries does not have its place at this university,” Dicko said. “The idea that language and symbols can ever be isolated from historical, political, or racial implications is not only naive, but it is also highly dangerous.”

Other organizations have also voiced their support outside the protest. On Oct. 29, the McGill University Non-Academic Certified Association, a labour union which represents the university’s non-academic support staff, sent a letter to Principal and Vice-Chancellor Suzanne Fortier, urging the administration to change the name and criticizing their lack of action thus far.

While the controversial name has been debated among the McGill community for decades, the push to change it has gained traction in the past few years. In 2016, McGill’s Task Force on Indigenous Studies and Indigenous Education found that, in the past, McGill media and yearbooks have used racial slurs against indigenous communities in reference to McGill athletic teams, including uses of the terms ‘indians,’ ‘squaws’ and the phrase ‘redmen scalped.’

Tomas Jirousek, SSMU Indigenous Affairs commissioner and a McGill varsity athlete, organized the protest and is a driving force behind the initiative to change the Redmen name.

“The demonstration is meant to express that indigenous students are hurting,” Jirousek said. “The name is offensive and creates a series of psychological and sociological effects which are quite negative and have repercussions for indigenous students on campus.”

McGill Athletics, however, claims that the name has no connection with offensive stereotyping of indigenous peoples. According to their website, the Redmen name solely refers to the school and uniform colours as well as the university’s Celtic history.

Even if the original intentions were not racist, this claim does not sit well with many students.

“I don’t believe them,” Aneeka Anderson, an Inuk U1 Arts student who attended the protest, said. “There are so many articles—I see new ones everyday—that present our perspective and the evidence that we have, proving that these names, despite the original intentions, were really warped and used in a very harmful way.”

McGill Athletics declined to comment on the demonstration and its call to change the name, instead forwarding an email sent out to the McGill community on Oct. 23. The email had informed students that the future of the name will be guided by the final report from the Working Group on Principles of Commemoration and Renaming, which is due to released in December. Ultimately, McGill’s Board of Governors has the final say in the decision.

Despite the uncertainty, the demonstration carried a message of optimism for the future and a belief that the name will be changed.

“I believe it will happen,” Anderson said. “Last year, in my first year, I said, ‘I want to do something to make this change,’ and at the time I didn’t know that other people were already doing those things and planning those things, so all I had to do was join them.”

The question “Do you endorse the immediate renaming of the ‘Redmen’ name and mandate the SSMU to work towards immediate renaming of the Varsity Men’s Team?” will appear on SSMU’s Fall referendum ballot. Voting will take place Nov. 9-12.

Arts & Entertainment, Film and TV

Dollar Cinema screens cult classic ‘Hausu’

by Noah Simon on

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On Oct. 31, Dollar Cinema hosted a special Halloween screening of Hausu, a 1977 Japanese cult horror film directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. The film follows a schoolgirl named Gorgeous who, upon discovering her father’s impending remarriage, travels with six friends to vacation at her aunt’s haunted country house. Although the trope of the haunted house is typical of the horror genre,  Hausu is anything but conventional. From the beginning, Hausu is, quite frankly, insane. Some of the more notable examples of its lunacy include people shapeshifting into bananas, an evil, carnivorous piano, and cats metamorphosing into people. Hausu is full of cinematic magic, complete with trippy special effects and cheap, B-movie thrills. It combines upbeat music, corny humour, gratuitous, over-the-top violence, and sharp self-awareness. These elements contribute to Hausu’s own particular brand of charm.

The film’s biggest trick, however, might be convincing the audience that it is not scary. Though it seems innocent and even childish at first, underneath Hausu’s campy veneer lies an extremely sinister film. When Gorgeous, Melody, Kung-Fu, Prof, and Fantasy finally decide to call the police after losing their other friends, the camera’s over-exposure gives the image a ghostly quality. Gorgeous—now possessed—picks up the phone, and, from the other side of the line, come the gruelling, horrid screams of her friends. These kinds of eerie moments are rare, but they suggest a much darker film below the superficial playfulness. The darker scenes are haunting within a movie where, for the most part, its characters implausibly ignore the horrors going on around them, and in which scares are often played off as jokes. The film toes the line between comedic and horrifying: In a running gag, characters yell “An illusion!” whenever they encounter the supernatural. Hausu doesn’t take itself too seriously, but it’s no less scary for it.

Like many horror films, Hausu is best experienced with a group. Through laughs, grimaces, or bewilderment, the film’s spectacle is only complete when sharing these moments. This may be why it is perfect for Dollar Cinema, a theatre known for showing movies months after their initial release at incredibly cheap prices. Dollar Cinema’s familiar atmosphere and underground reputation make it the ideal place for a film like Hausu and its ardent fans.

Bernie Gurberg, Dollar Cinema’s eccentric owner, recently ran for Montreal mayor on one simple campaign promise: Cut the poverty line. While he lost the election, Dollar Cinema is proof of his ability to provide a space for people to enjoy themselves without breaking the bank. The theatre was packed for Hausu, and according to the event organizer, was one of its most successful screenings, other than Rocky Horror Picture Show, another iconic cult film. Films like Hausu, with its colourful personality and meta-cinematic nature, will always attract cult followings, and Dollar Cinema is the perfect spot for movie nerds to convene at an affordable price.

 

Arts & Entertainment, Film and TV

‘Mid90s’ tugs at familiar heartstrings

by Sophie Brzozowski on

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“I think it’s really dope that times are changing,” a grinning Jonah Hill said in an interview with the hosts of New York City-based radio show The Breakfast Club. In lieu of introducing himself, the 34-year-old actor-turned-director launched into a monologue about how exciting it is that counter-culture-centred media outlets are finally featuring mainstream celebrities.

After becoming a household name through now-iconic films such as Superbad (2007), 21 Jump Street (2012), and The Wolf of Wall Street (2013),  it is hard to imagine that Hill was ever a rough and tumble skate-rat like the kind depicted in his directorial debut Mid90s. The film follows Stevie (Sunny Suljic), a 13-year-old boy from an unstable home in Los Angeles who finds solace and brotherhood in a band of teenagers at the local skate shop. As Stevie slowly becomes integrated into their tight-knit circle, he falls in love with skateboarding and the subculture’s debauchery.

As any skate film must, Mid90s makes doing drugs and breaking the law look cool. The more poignant scenes of mischief, however, manage to evoke both nostalgia and concern, in large part due to Stevie’s young age. Suljic, born in 2005, looks comically small next to the teenage boys he admires. The scenes in which he is pictured holding a forty of liquor that is almost as large as his skinny torso are at once funny and heartbreaking.

Though the film deals with themes of domestic abuse, race, and poverty, it falls short of providing any sort of impactful commentary on these issues. At times, it seems like Hill may fallen into the trap of equating actual marginalization with the feeling of being an outcast. One of the more touching scenes in the film finds the group’s leader, Ray (Na-Kel Smith) consoling Stevie after he has a violent altercation with his older brother (Lucas Hedges). To make him feel less alone, Ray reveals to Stevie the troubled home lives of the rest of the characters, as if to imply that their shared struggles brought them together.

Although perhaps lacking in imagination, and, at times, tact, Mid90s still manages to be captivating in a sentimental sort of way. Underscored by an original soundtrack written in part by Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails, the film meets its gnarly skate footage quota, adding to its authenticity. Hill cast pro skateboarders Olan Prenatt, Ryder McLaughlin, Na-Kel Smith and Gio Galicia to play the group of friends who take Stevie under their wing, and the entire ensemble delivers compelling performances on and off their boards. Suljic, easily one of the more charming child actors of our time, delivered an endearing and emotional performance well beyond his years.

Along with 2017’s Lady Bird, Mid90s provides compelling evidence that, contrary to popular belief, the sub-genre of movies about teenagers doing nothing of substance has yet to be exhausted. The day-to-day misadventures of boys coming-of-age are plentiful, but remain, for whatever reason, unexpectedly moving.

Perhaps, it’s because there were so few female characters of significance, but, unlike with Lady Bird, or even 2013’s Palo Alto, the bittersweet depictions of adolescence didn’t make me reminisce about my own teenage escapades. Instead, they reminded me of my younger brother. He’s a few years older than Stevie and has never, to my knowledge, stepped foot on a skateboard. However, I’ve watched from a distance as he’s navigated young adulthood in similarly calamitous and idiotic ways. At times, I wanted to strangle Stevie, but mostly I just wanted to look after him.

Mid90s was, by no means, a groundbreaking film. At its core, the moral of the story is simply that adolescence always has and always will be fun and painful and confusing. It’s a shallow message, but, for what it’s worth, a true one.

 

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