So why's this relevant? Well, I introduce something very dear to our hearts and shaped our lives as ballers. PUSH.
Like all the great skate videos I used to watch when I was busting myself up like a stuntman, PUSH has that 'coming of age' feel about it. It doesn't just show you something and how to do it; it captures the whole emotion and feeling of that era of paintball, which I'm pretty sure anyone playing around the 12 year mark will completely understand.
What is it then? Well, pull up a chair, grab a pack of biscuits and a cup of tea and let me tell you a little story.
When we played Bully's Series in 2000 we set up a fresh little team called K2 (we'll do a post all about K2 soon, you'll like it). All buddies, getting together to play paintball once a month for fun. This then became hugely competitive and we started to take things more seriously, playing the Mayhem Masters, Campaign Cup, French Masters, ZAP European Indoor and more, but still having a ton of fun at the heart of it. During the week we'd all hook up at Chris' house, watch paintball vids, talk about our plans for the weekend and basically LIVE paintball. Good times; no, GREAT times. Traumahead Sports VHS tapes, yes kids actual video tapes, were our vice. We loved em. Watching hours of event footage from the states to copy how the big players did things and trying out some of their tactics really helped us build a team that played pretty solid paintball. Watching these videos defined our 'golden days' of paintball as we grew into the sport. We loved Traumahead, but a certain mister Patrick Spohrer decided one day to create a totally new way of telling the paintball story, that became so much more than simply showing games. Enter PUSH.
I remember the night well. Most of the K2 mob were there and we played it. First impressions were that we just wanted games and we were a bit miffed by it. It seemed a little too artsy. So we played it again, and again and I think we almost watched it 4 times back to back that night, which set the tone for our love of this movie. What Patrick Spohrer, Bryon Benini and their crew had achieved was incredible. A road movie that embodied the very soul of everything that paintball means to every single paintballer on the planet. The hunger to win, the love of playing, the passion for the game, the upset that comes with loss and above all; the bond that paintball creates between every member of every team. And its this bond between team mates that PUSH captures so, so well.
This film itself came out in 2001 and is a documentary style film following the journey to the 2000 World Cup. It follows the stories of the biggest names in paintball history, who's teams and players pretty much laid the foundations of tournament paintball as we know it. Avalanche, Ironmen, Image, Aftershock and the All Americans take centre stage to show us, through the eyes of their superstar players, their stories.
Chris LaSoya, Rocky Cagnoni, Shane Pestrana, Mike Bruno, Billy Ceranski, young Matty Marshall and Todd Martinez; all the big old school names who were the dominant role models give interviews, tell stories and talk about their feelings before and after key games in the run up to the Cup. There's footage of players goofing around outside of ball, having a laugh together and sharing their paintball roller coaster ride to the Cup, something that just hadn't been done to this standard before. It truly was...IS, a groundbreaking piece of film making that set the tone for how new paintball films were to be approached.
Then there's the soundtrack. Every single track, when you hear it even now, strikes a chord of emotion right through you. Maybe it's because of the good times we had then, maybe its the awesome film sections related to the tracks that makes you feel all gooey inside, whatever it is the soundtrack is amazing. So much so that we've managed to find most of the tracks and created a Spotify playlist in the sidebar. I gotta admit, the night before every event from 2001 to the present day I always listen to one particular track. It gets me in THAT place...you know what I mean.
I could literally go on all day about PUSH and how much it means to us. But I won't. And I'll be honest, I love PUSH so much but no review could ever really do it justice. You should experience it for yourselves. We love to see all the new school documentary series' that are now being pumped out monthly such as the Artifact Series, which do a similar thing. They take us into a world that some of us have tasted, that some of us never will and that some of us aspire to reach. And this, my compadres, is all because of a film called PUSH.
Is this a good watch?
No, it's an AMAZING watch. The action, although dated now is brilliant and features some of the games most eye opening moves, such as Cagnoni's snake attack. The stories are superb and ones that we can all relate to, even now.
Highlights:
So, so many. This film is loaded with gems and one liners. Look out for Rocky Cagnoni diving the snake, Danny Love crying like a baby and Renick Miller getting all confused with his Aftershock maths.
Verdict:
This is a must-see for any self respecting paintballer, more than ever if you ask me, with all the big money moves and career balling that goes on nowadays. It captures the very soul of what paintballing is to everyone at every level and for that alone is worth it.
Right, I'm off to watch it again and have a little cry.
