Friday, August 14, 2015

STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON (B+)

Witness the strength and influence of street knowledge in director F. Gary Gray’s near-masterful and fascinatingly raw depiction of N.W.A. and their meteoric and legacy-leaving rise to stardom.  A pulse-pounding, thought-provoking and head-bopping origin story, STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON tells an intricately and compellingly woven tale of forged friendships, brotherly bonds, societal acceptance and freedom of speech – all with heart, humor and great deal of hubris.  Minor setbacks here include some clichéd melodrama (which is inherent to the biopic genre in general) – as well as glossing the protagonists as a relatively clean-nosed band of brothers that only held a mirror to their surroundings, put pen to paper and dropped some sick beats…  Their explicit lyrics lead me to believe otherwise (perhaps wrongly, perhaps I’m outta line).  Outside of those minor issues, this is a perfectly cast (like seriously, this relatively unknown cast is superb), tightly directed, engagingly written piece of controversial, must-see cinema.  This is not a movie to be watched, it’s a movie to be experienced.  You may not agree with their explicit, demeaning and extremely violent approach, but there’s no denying its potent relevancy in the 80’s, 90’s and even today.

Starring: O’shea Jackson Jr, Corey Hawkins, Jason Mitchell, Aldis Hodge, Neil Brown Jr and Paul Giamatti
Directed by: F. Gary Gray (FRIDAY, THE NEGOTIATOR and THE ITALIAN JOB)
Rated: R
Running time: 2hrs. 27min.
Story: In the mid-1980s, the streets of Compton, California, were some of the most dangerous in the country. When five young men translated their experiences growing up into brutally honest music that rebelled against abusive authority, they gave an explosive voice to a silenced generation. Following the meteoric rise and fall of N.W.A., Straight Outta Compton tells the astonishing story of how these youngsters revolutionized music and pop culture forever the moment they told the world the truth about life in the hood and ignited a cultural war. -- (C) Universal Pictures

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