Hell on Wheels
Hell on Wheels is a documentary about the beginnings of the roller derby resurgence in Austin, Texas. Clearly, it was a long time coming--though it was just released this fall, the interviews take place between 2001 and 2004. This is before the A&E television show, Rollergirls (which I reviewed here), which is about the same league. If you've already seen Rollergirls, this makes some of the movie seem a bit redundant. However, it also brings to light a lot of what Rollergirls leaves out.
Hell on Wheels is the story of how roller derby came to Austin, and why one league became two. Basically, four women started the league (it was actually some dude's idea, but he was out of the picture fairly quickly). As it grew, they incorporated it, making it a business, of which they were the owners. Many of the skaters had a problem both with this top-down business and leadership model, and with how the league was being run. After several attempts at compromise, there was a split, wherein most of the skaters left and formed their own skater-run league.
The original women then recruited new skaters to keep the first league going, and eventually all of founders stepped down and the original league became skater-run as well. This is why there are two roller derby leagues in Austin - the TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls (the original league and the one the A&E series is about) and the Texas Rollergirls. The first is banked track, the second flat track, but both are currently skater-run.
Hell on Wheels is a story about a group of women working together, attempting compromises, and eventually parting ways. There is very little actual skating in the movie. Mostly, it is scenes of women yelling at each other or talking about each other. While clearly this did happen, it is a short-coming of the filmmaker that he chose to focus so much on this aspect of the story, rather than on the rather awesome creation of not one, but two, successful leagues.
About Rollergirls, I wrote, "Although there are clear critiques that can be made of the...cattiness that the show focuses on at times, at the end I'm left feeling like the enterprise is very, very pro-woman." This is the missing piece in Hell on Wheels. Rather than allowing the viewer to feel positive about something the women she is watching have created, she's left feeling negative about the way that they treat each other.
Hell on Wheels also lacks the attention to race and (especially) class that I liked so much in Rollergirls. The skaters featured are, without exception, white. This is never acknowledged. All discussions about money are about how the league doesn't have any. Some of the skaters complain about paying dues of $25 per month, but it seems to be more a matter of principle than of economics. With the exception of Nancy, one of the league's founders, who is a metalworker and is shown at work, there isn't any mention of the skaters' "day jobs." Some of this, of course, must be attributed to the difference in time between a television series and a fairly short documentary. Even in the time the filmmaker had, though, I think a few minutes could have been dedicated to these issues, and it wasn't.
Even after seeing how much in fighting hampered the Austin roller derby's inception, I still give the derby itself four HC stars. I think it's an amazing enterprise and the women who skate in it are definite heroines. This film, however, sells them short, which it didn't have to do, and so it gets only two stars.
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Nice to see y'all posting again!
I haven't seen this. But it sounds like it came across more like a reality show than a documentary. I guess I probably won't pay to rent it.
Oh, also, there's an essay y'all might find relevant to your work here. I was reading it yesterday and thought of you. It's in the book Killing Rage by bell hooks, and the essay's called, Teaching Resistance: The Racial Politics of Mass Media.
I saw this movie at an art institute when the filmmaker went on tour with it. It was interesting to talk to him at the bar afterwards. He seemed to have been very tied in with all of the infighting due to how much time he spent filming everyone (and how much he got to know them). This may explain his inability to pull away and show something other than cattiness--he was so immersed in the drama, himself, that he couldn't step away and really tell an unbiased story.
Anyhow, you point out that there are very few non-white women in the documentary. As a rollergirl, I've often reflected on the overwhelming whiteness of derby, in general. For example, I live in a city that is 38% caucasian and 53% black. Our proportion of white derby players is about 98%, and our number of African American players is exactly 0. I think there are many reasons for why this is true--e.g., derby's close ties to the predominantly white punk-rock movement, and the fact that our founders came from a white part of a pretty segregated city and the positive feedback loop that originates from a grassroots movement whose members are mostly white and so mostly operate in white parts of the city. Yet, when we get dressed for practice, the people who have attended the previous hours' open skate are packing up their skates to go home, and they are at least 85% African American. Many of them take an interest in what we're doing (and many of them are fantastic skaters), but none of them has ever joined the league. I have a feeling from our conversations that none of them wants to be "the black girl", and that the stereotype of derby being a white sport keeps them away. In a sport that does so much for the women who join, I have no idea how to break that cycle and successfully reach out to minority women.
Anyhow, I know Texas' isn't as white as my league, but in a sport where most of the athletes--and even more of the women in power--are so white, documentaries about derby are going to be about white women. I don't see this as being the filmmakers' fault as much as it is the fault of us in the current derby movement. We absolutely must find a way to be more inclusive.
I'm so glad you weighed in!! I'm surprised to hear that your league is so white, given your city's population. That's really too bad. I'm not sure how to change it either, though. :(
I love roller derby! Thanks for sharing this. I had no idea there was a show AND a documentary! I'm running out and getting them ASAP.