Wick's Review

Summary - Great 4.0

Art imitates reality in Straight Outta Compton. Actually it amplifies, glamorizes and ultimately twists reality. The art is Gangsta Rap, the reality African-American ghetto life, the artistic twists many.

Twists aside, the movie is a semi-accurate chronicle of an important pop-culture movement, from which reverberations are still being felt. Black-on-black violence, criminal entrepreneurship and heavy-handed policing inspired breakthrough music from N.W.A., a cadre of naturally gifted young black men. They became crossover stars, their radical chic shitshow inspiring kids white & black to open their wallets.

Girls of all races dropped their tops, opened their legs and became subservient bitches in the presence of these bad-boy stars. Crooked show-business dealings also came with the territory. Of course it did.

Straight Outta Compton documents how this huge overnight success led to such rap-style rockstar excess. It apparently messes significantly with the record, but that’s to be expected in a biopic produced by its leading principals, notably Ice Cube and Dr. Dre. With the deceased Eazy-E, they dominate the movie.

You don’t need to be a hard-core hip-hop fan to appreciate the movie, but must tolerate a parade of horribles that includes savage beatings, dog fighting, women treated as chattel and pathological hatred towards police. About that last, viewing Straight Outta Compton during 2015’s wave of police ambushes shows how pop-culture amplifies the glamour of violence, thus turning legitimate frustrations into toxic dysfunction. Non-stars – black and white, uniformed and civilian – are the ones who then get really hurt.

Acting - Very Good 3.5

N.W.A.

• O’Shea Jackson, Jr. is nails as O’Shea Jackson, Sr., aka Ice Cube.
• Corey Hawkins is lucky enough to share Dr. Dre’s regal hauteur.
• Jason Mitchell oozes easygoing charm, the kind that had Eazy-E fucking random girls from the age of 12 until he died of AIDS 20 years later.
• Aldis Hodge & Neil Brown, Jr take a back seat as MC Ren & DJ Yella respectively.

Show “Business”

• Paul Giamatti as Jerry Heller, the controversial manager. Imagine that.
• R. Marcos Taylor as Suge Knight, who killed a man during the movie’s filming, a move completely in character with the guy we meet on screen.
• Mark Sherman as Jimmy Iovine, now an Apple billionaire along with Dr. Dre, courtesy of their Beats sale to the great Tree of Delight.

Discoveries

• Keith Stanfield as Snoop Dogg
• Marcc Rose as Tupac Shakur

Film - Great 4.0

The film is a workmanlike biopic, rockstar variety. Think non-satirical Spinal Tap, gangsta rap style

Edge - Sordid 3.4

Super Sordid

Reality - Glib 1.6

This biopic produced by Dr. Dre and Ice Cube about Dr. Dre, Ice Cube and their bandmates is kind of a warts-and-all effort, except it cuts several violent acts committed by Dr. Dre and others. Ah, Hollywood!

LA Weekly documented 9 Truths Cut from the movie.

1 Comment

• Felix Aug 29, 2015 6:07PM

  Regarding BrianSez’s Review
  I really want to see this movie. I love this era of rap and hip hop. Too bad it faded out and gave way to the garbage that’s called rap today.

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