If you have been following My Filmviews for a while you know I am a big fan of documentaries. I have had the feeling that during the last couple of months there weren’t as many documentaries released as normally. It might be that I have missed a lot of news about them, but I felt there was a bit of a drought. So I was happy to see this one being released. The pictures I saw about it looked exciting, with people on motorcycles popping wheelies. So was watching it as exciting?
Director Lotfy Nathan spent a long time in Baltimore filming the 12 O’Clock Boys. It is a motorcycle gang who is known to ride through town in big groups, stopping traffic and performing all kind of tricks. They even sometimes drive on the sidewalk, which of course has led to some issues. As this documentary shows there is quite some news footage as well, talking about the problems they cause. Nathan follow Pug, a young boy who dreams of one day becoming part of the group. He drives around on his quad and stops doing everything once he sees the group is about to drive by. He is obsessed and does not seem to care about much else. He enjoys his moments in front of the camera and is very interesting to watch.
With a documentary title referencing the ATV and quad riding group though I was expecting more insight in their world of which there unfortunately isn’t enough. We see them doing some crazy things (even one of them attacking a cop car), but there aren’t many interviews with the members talking about their passion and why they are doing it. There is also no insight of the impact the group has on the neighbourhood or interviews with the police talking about what they are doing to make sure that the group doesn’t cause any accidents. All the questions I had were not answered unfortunately and although i don’t expect a documentary to answer them all I stil had too many left after watching it.
