Set in my hometown of Rockford, Illinois, director Bing Liu’s documentary about the confines of the city and the toll it takes on it’s residents speaks immeasurable volumes.
Primarily focusing on Zack and Keire’s life in Rockford as young adults trying to cope with the stress of reality. Having lived life in crumbling households and flawed father figures physically disassembling them any chance they could get. The cinematography in these sequences elicits a constant threat to their personalities while living in Rockford. Bing ocassionally cuts to billboards around Rockford that ask about parenthood and the struggles of being a parental figure. Conveying that Rockford, a struggling place, is practically self aware of the negative living conditions for the population.
Juxtaposed to this is Bing’s free flowing and angelic sequences of skateboarding. An escape into a realm that allows them to get away from Rockford’s draining cityscapes and streets lined with abandoned buildings. Here we see Zack and Keire at their happiest as they release any anger, grief, sadness, or pain into skateboarding. It’s beautifully composed in a way that some veterans don’t know how, and Bing, being the young adult he is captures the tone and meaning of the film as if he’d been making films for decades.
After a while, the reality may pack too much of a punch, but having been a resident of Rockford myself, I can exclaim that is the toll this city takes on it’s residents. When our family moved to Arizona in 2009 from the knee-high snow to the mountainous deserts, all of life’s problems seemed to get lost on the way. The city no longer felt like a ticking time bomb, but rather a vast array of fresh air and new beginnings. Escaping the grasps of a city tearing itself apart is no easy task, and Bing perfectly captures that emotion as the film begins to close. Leaving your family behind is no easy decision to make as tears begin to well in your eyes in doing so, but there is more opportunity outside of Rockford. A life worth exploring as it coats itself over a past that still hurts when you think about it.
In the end, Rockford molds people into beings they never wanted to be. Specifically, young men not wanting to turn into their fathers but doing so anyways because of the setting they’re apart of. Minding the Gap is a tremendous achievement in documentary filmmaking as it deals with soul crushing themes and harsh living conditions. Minding the Gap is a must-see for all, and a requirement for the residents of Rockford, Illinois.
Minding the Gap gets a 98/100