Catherine Hardwicke

Catherine Hardwicke knew exactly what she was getting herself into when she signed on to direct the big-screen adaptation of "Twilight," the first installment in author Stephenie Meyer's bestselling young adult franchise about everygirl Bella Swan and her vampire beau Edward Cullen. The filmmaker had turned up to see the author on an L.A.-area stop on her 2007 book tour and witnessed firsthand the near hysteria the books inspire among legions of largely young, largely female readers.

You may remember that the last time we wrote about Catherine Hardwicke back in December, it was to lament the news that the gifted filmmaker, after delivering a lucrative franchise starter to Summit Entertainment in the form of "Twilight," was being pushed aside, with Summit moving ahead on a sequel to the hit film without her. It's fair to say that Hardwicke had her own doubts about continuing with the series. Nonetheless, the fallout from the news -- with fans voicing complaints about the franchise losing its top creative voice, not to mention its top female voice outside of author Stephenie Meyer -- made it look like a very unhappy parting of the ways.

Before there were X Games, before there were skate parks on every corner, miniature Tony Hawk figures in every Happy Meal, there was the myth of the Dogbowl -- an expanse of curved and flowing concrete that drew skateboarders like a mythical Siren. It was small, tight and dangerous -- an empty, kidney-shaped swimming pool at the back of a Santa Monica mansion.

The rowdy and sometimes painfully raw "Lords of Dogtown" is a perfect marriage between film and skateboarder, and the way in which the camera tracks every incredible move of the movie's virtuosos gives it a dynamic, exhilarating energy.

There used to be formalized rites of passage to bridge the gap between childhood and adulthood; now some kids just fall into the chasm and barely get out. Blame it on the lack of parental guidance, blame it on the modern temptations of sex, drugs and consumer products, but it's a particularly perilous moment for an adolescent girl.