''This Is Roller Derby'' is a 2011 Australian

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...

by Daniel Hayward on four Australian roller derby teams over the course of a season. The film features members from

roller derby Roller derby is a roller skating contact sport played by two teams of fifteen members. Roller derby is played by approximately 1,250 amateur leagues worldwide, mostly in the United States. Game play consists of a series of short scrimmages (jam ...

associations from Australia and the United States, primarily the

Ballarat Roller Derby League Ballarat Roller Derby (BRD) is a roller derby league based in the Victorian city of Ballarat. Founded in 2008, the league has three competitive co-ed home teams, two junior roller derby teams, an all-female away/travel team and a referee tea ...

. The DVD for the film released on 20 February 2013.

Synopsis

The film follows four Australian roller derby leagues,

Adelaide Roller Derby Adelaide Roller Derby (ADRD) is a roller derby league based in Adelaide, South Australia. Founded in 2007, the league has four competitive home teams; The Mile Die Club, The Salties (formerly The Salty Dolls), The Road Train Rollers and The W ...

Canberra Roller Derby League The Canberra Roller Derby League (CRDL) is a Canberra-based roller derby league. It was created in 2008, with the first bouts occurring in 2009. Canberra currently holds the Division 1 trophy for The Great Southern Slam. Canberra is a member ...

and

Geelong Roller Derby League Geelong Roller Derby (GRD) is a roller derby league based in the Victoria (Australia), Victorian city of Geelong. Founded in 2008, the GRD has one team that competes and in interleague bouts. They support both men and women in the league, but t ...

, over the course of twelve months, and documents the start of roller derby in Australia and overseas.

Cast and crew

The film was directed by Daniel Hayward and features members from the Ballarat Roller Derby League and members from US leagues, particularly

Texas Rollergirls Texas Rollergirls is a women's flat track roller derby league based in Austin, Texas. Founded in early 2003 and widely credited as the league that started the modern roller derby movement, the Texas Rollergirls were the first flat-track league in ...

and

TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls Texas Roller Derby (TXRD), formerly known as Texas Lonestar Rollergirls, is a banked-track roller derby league based in Austin, Texas. Founded in 2001, TXRD is one of several leagues considered responsible for the modern roller derby revival. ...

. Some featured Roller Derby skaters include: * April Ritzenthaler (Narrator) * Katrina "Mad Mac" MacDonald * Haylee "Seven Lux" Hartley * Rebekah "Apocalypse Nerd" Bailey * Sarah "Barrelhouse Bessy" Strong-Law * Nadia "Smartypants" Keane * Michelle "Miss Hellfire" Murrel * Kim "Jelli Knight" Adams

Reception

Filmink gave a positive review for ''This Is Roller Derby'', calling it a "gutsy and eye-opening insight into a sport on the rise and the world around it." SBS gave a mixed review for the film, saying that while the first half of the film has "genuine energy", that "in driving his material towards a feature-length running time of 80-odd minutes, Hayward steers into a cul-de-sac, showing longer extracts of the action from tournaments rather than digger deeper into some of the personal stories."

References

External links

* * Australian sports documentary films Roller derby films 2011 documentary films 2011 films Roller derby in Australia Films shot in Victoria (state) Films shot in Adelaide 2010s English-language films {{sport-documentary-film-stub