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Lords of Dogtown is a 2005 film directed by Catherine Hardwicke, with music by Mark Mothersbaugh. The film is based on the story of the "The Z-Boys", an influential group of skateboarders who revolutionized the sport. Mitch Hedberg, a famous stand-up comedian who appears in the movie, died before the film was released. The movie is dedicated in his memory.

Stacy Peralta, played by John Robinson, is a world famous skateboarder who later becomes a film director. Peralta created the documentary Dogtown and Z-Boys, from whose story Lords of Dogtown is based, and also worked on the screenplay for Lords of Dogtown. In the film, Peralta is portrayed as a "good guy," not getting into as much trouble as the other characters and displaying more responsibility.Tony Alva, played by Victor Rasuk, grew up with a strict, sometimes angry father, and is portrayed as having a strong desire to be the center of attention. With the rise of the Z-boys and the Dogtown era, Alva develops an ego that drives his friends and family away from him.Jay Adams, played by Emile Hirsch, is portrayed as the most innately talented of the group. Adams was raised in a broken home and uses skateboarding as an outlet to vent his frustrations. The extreme life Adams leads draws him apart from the other Z-boys and into a life of gang violence towards the end of the film.Sid, a lesser character played by Michael Angarano, enjoys skating with the other Z-Boys but can't skate as well as they can. He spends a lot of time working in and cleaning the Zephyr shop. The boys often bust on him for his "inner ear problem," and in one scene, when the entire team is skating down the street, Wentzle Ruml skates up alongside him and screams to throw him off balance. Sid falls painfully on the curb. Later in the movie, Sid's equilibrium problem turns out to be a tumor. He can no longer skate after the operation. Since he is rich and has a pool, the boys have wanted to skate it ever since the pool-skating revolution that they led caught on. In the end of the movie, the estranged characters all re-unite at Sid's pool, which he had drained for them. They skate it together in a powerful emotional moment.

The Z-boys altered public perception of skateboarding significantly. Once thought to be a mere pastime for surfers during periods of poor wave activity, skateboarding began, under the influence of the Z-boys, to be percieved by the general populace as a sport in its own right and a legitimate form of personal expression. Today, practitioners of the sport as well as spectators generally give the Z-boys an immense amount of respect for their contributions to the history of skateboarding.