Pug, a thirteen-year-old boy in Westside, Baltimore, wants nothing more than to join the 12 O’Clock Boys, a motorcycle gang named after the audacious wheelies they pull while riding illegally through neighborhood streets and sidewalks, chased by police cars and helicopters. Looking beyond the sensational and harrowing stunts of the riders, director Lotfy Nathan focuses on the pivotal adolescent moments of an impressionable and determined youth growing up amid family tragedy and community turmoil. Pug’s own narration, alternately swaggering and poetic, illustrates his consciousness forming within the constructive and destructive forces of the riding subculture.

(SXSW 2013)

FILMMAKER IN PERSON!

LOFTY NATHAN (director), 26, is a filmmaker and visual artist based in New York. He has received the Grainger Marburg Travel grant, fellowships from the Garrett Scott foundation, Compound group, IFP Doc Lab, & IFP Spotlight. 12 O’Clock Boys is his first feature-length documentary.