It is an interesting and perhaps altogether mortifying thing to note that human progress, by and large, takes an awful lot of time. While our technological prowess grows exponentially by the day, threatening to overwhelm us and outrun us as we give it its own consciousness, we fail to understand that it is the very nature of the computer mind to NOT continue to make the same mistakes, over and over again, in pointless, deadly cycles. While that is very much the case for HUMAN minds.
I haven't seen a much better case for said behavior than I did in F. Gary Gray's majesty of a movie, STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON. Even though there aren't any Terminators in it, nor are there any real technological threats to be seen. No, the threats noted here are the same, old, TIRED ones.
Inequality. Oppression. Indignity. Ignorance.
STUPIDITY.
You have to admire racism for its stubbornness. It's not enough that people hate each other based on skin color and culture, you have to remember that the people that HAVE the skin color and culture you hate were brought to America against their will. They didn't ask to be here. And you're nothing more than a damned fool to simply say, "Well then get the hell out", after ancestors and generations of idiots enslaved, raped, tortured, and murdered them simply to profit from their labor and rise into strong, almost morally bankrupt country as a result. There's a stereotype that's been created here, for African Americans, and this is a movie that's not shy about illustrating that.
It doesn't CHAMPION that, it ILLUSTRATES that. There's no judgment here, and that's one of this film's strongest points.
When five young men in Compton decide, eventually, to join together to create a new, completely original music genre based on what they have to go through in the America of the late eighties and early nineties, at the resistance of almost everyone who thinks playing it safe is always the best way to go, they create something truly original. Great art comes from great suffering, and these men suffer regularly at the hands of a society that treats them poorly based on appearance more often than actual behavior, illustrated not only by scene but by historical reference throughout the film. What comes out of their mouths and out of their speakers is an outcry of anger, defiance, and resistance, and it is POWERFUL. Great art is also the subject of great change, and that is what these men have started here, with their bravery and talent.
I think O'Shea Jackson Jr. (who plays Ice Cube and is, ironically, his son) and Corey Hawkins (who masterfully plays Dr. Dre) steal nearly every scene they are in. They are the brains of the bunch, the smartest and the most talented of the group, and you can see it and feel it in every scene. This is not to say that Jason Mitchell (who plays a touching, charming and moving Eazy-E), Neil Brown Jr. (who plays DJ Yella) and Aldis Hodge (who plays MC Ren) do not have their strengths, because they do. NOBODY in this production has a small role, from the extras in the backgrounds without names to the women that support our five stars as they battle their way to the front. Everyone is rich, the atmosphere is vibrant and alive, the soundtrack is perfectly placed and implemented, even the shots of city-scapes are those of beauty.
I've left out Paul Giamatti as Jerry Heller, the man responsible for managing the up-and-coming N.W.A. Without giving away too much of the movie, I will say he delivers as he always does, being the perfect middle-man antagonist, that starts out seemingly innocent as he slowly grows into something more sinister.
And finally we come to the message, which is this: Nothing is as simple as it seems. Nobody can be ascertained simply by appearance. Things just don't suddenly go wrong. Change does NOT happen overnight. And the biggest, most powerful message of all, the one that nobody learns, even though it's been repeated over and over again as we continue down this merry path to ever more creative means of self-destruction:
You can't keep punching people in the face without expecting them to fight back. You can't continue to try to use fear to hold everybody down while you walk away the victorious tyrant. Those that dared to hold these guys down will be forgotten, while the words they said and the music they made will last long after everyone involved in this era of Americana become food for worms.
STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON is the kind of truth we need right now. And I absolutely loved it.
I haven't seen a much better case for said behavior than I did in F. Gary Gray's majesty of a movie, STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON. Even though there aren't any Terminators in it, nor are there any real technological threats to be seen. No, the threats noted here are the same, old, TIRED ones.
Inequality. Oppression. Indignity. Ignorance.
STUPIDITY.
You have to admire racism for its stubbornness. It's not enough that people hate each other based on skin color and culture, you have to remember that the people that HAVE the skin color and culture you hate were brought to America against their will. They didn't ask to be here. And you're nothing more than a damned fool to simply say, "Well then get the hell out", after ancestors and generations of idiots enslaved, raped, tortured, and murdered them simply to profit from their labor and rise into strong, almost morally bankrupt country as a result. There's a stereotype that's been created here, for African Americans, and this is a movie that's not shy about illustrating that.
It doesn't CHAMPION that, it ILLUSTRATES that. There's no judgment here, and that's one of this film's strongest points.
When five young men in Compton decide, eventually, to join together to create a new, completely original music genre based on what they have to go through in the America of the late eighties and early nineties, at the resistance of almost everyone who thinks playing it safe is always the best way to go, they create something truly original. Great art comes from great suffering, and these men suffer regularly at the hands of a society that treats them poorly based on appearance more often than actual behavior, illustrated not only by scene but by historical reference throughout the film. What comes out of their mouths and out of their speakers is an outcry of anger, defiance, and resistance, and it is POWERFUL. Great art is also the subject of great change, and that is what these men have started here, with their bravery and talent.
I think O'Shea Jackson Jr. (who plays Ice Cube and is, ironically, his son) and Corey Hawkins (who masterfully plays Dr. Dre) steal nearly every scene they are in. They are the brains of the bunch, the smartest and the most talented of the group, and you can see it and feel it in every scene. This is not to say that Jason Mitchell (who plays a touching, charming and moving Eazy-E), Neil Brown Jr. (who plays DJ Yella) and Aldis Hodge (who plays MC Ren) do not have their strengths, because they do. NOBODY in this production has a small role, from the extras in the backgrounds without names to the women that support our five stars as they battle their way to the front. Everyone is rich, the atmosphere is vibrant and alive, the soundtrack is perfectly placed and implemented, even the shots of city-scapes are those of beauty.
I've left out Paul Giamatti as Jerry Heller, the man responsible for managing the up-and-coming N.W.A. Without giving away too much of the movie, I will say he delivers as he always does, being the perfect middle-man antagonist, that starts out seemingly innocent as he slowly grows into something more sinister.
And finally we come to the message, which is this: Nothing is as simple as it seems. Nobody can be ascertained simply by appearance. Things just don't suddenly go wrong. Change does NOT happen overnight. And the biggest, most powerful message of all, the one that nobody learns, even though it's been repeated over and over again as we continue down this merry path to ever more creative means of self-destruction:
You can't keep punching people in the face without expecting them to fight back. You can't continue to try to use fear to hold everybody down while you walk away the victorious tyrant. Those that dared to hold these guys down will be forgotten, while the words they said and the music they made will last long after everyone involved in this era of Americana become food for worms.
STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON is the kind of truth we need right now. And I absolutely loved it.