JUICE is an early ’90s “hood movie” about four young friends in New York who fall into some stupid shit. Tired of getting picked on by the Puerto Rican kids and the cops and not having money, they decide to get a gun (just one between them) and rob a little mini-mart where the guy is an asshole and yells at them sometimes. It’s not exactly The Thomas Crown Affair they’re trying to pull off, but they’re amateurs so they fuck up this small time crime and have to deal with the aftermath. (more…)
Posts Tagged ‘Ed Lover’
Juice
Tuesday, November 29th, 2011
Who’s the Man?
Friday, December 17th, 2010
You know how nowadays everybody wanna talk like they got somethin to say, but nothin comes out when they move their lips, just a bunch of gibberish, and motherfuckers act like they forgot about Dre? And this despite the widespread recognition of Dre Day, and everybody’s celebratin? Well, that must be tough for Dre, but it’s even worse for Dré.
Dr. Dre – title abbreviated, name spelled with an ‘e’, not an ‘é’ – is the famous producer/rapper, the genius behind NWA, discoverer of Snoop and Eminem, headphone consultant, Dr. Pepper advocate. He still produces, is still highly respected despite unleashing 50 Cent, appears on commercials all the time but somehow still has a mystique about him. He recently released a song from the album he’s been working on for ten years, so he’s on the cover of magazines and people are really believing it’ll come out in February. And plan to buy it. Most rap careers don’t last as long as just the time people have been anticipating this one album by Dre.
Meanwhile Doctor Dré – title spelled out in full, name spelled with a little wavy thing above the ‘e’ – you could definitely make a strong argument that motherfuckers weren’t acting, they sincerely had forgotten about that particular Dré. (more…)
Undisputed
Saturday, January 1st, 2005I decided a long time ago to stop reviewing prison movies. People always ask me what I thought of this prison movie or that. They recommended ANIMAL FACTORY and that was a real good one, but I don’t want people to take me more seriously about prison than they would other film writers like the guy from Entertainment Weekly or the guy from People Magazine and etc. Plus, why would I want to sit around and watch movies about a place like that anyway.
I made an exception for UNDISPUTED though because I been looking forward to this ever since I saw the trailer before BLADE II. The BLADE pictures made me love Wesley Snipes and I try to see any movie he does now, even if it looks like some asinine remake of ROCKY, but in prison.
Turns out it’s not a ROCKY ripoff, but it is asinine. The premise is that Wesley’s character Munro Hutchence is the undefeated champion boxer in a high security prison called Sweetwater. Then the real heavyweight champion of the world, George “Iceman” Chambers (played by Ving Rhames) ends up at Sweetwater because he either did or didn’t do exactly what Mike Tyson either did or didn’t do. Like Forrest Gump, it’s left blank, you get to decide for yourself whether he did it or not, based on your own prejudices. Anyway Peter Falk, as an old time mafioso who apparently is some kind of boxing purist, sets up a match between the two, Wesley wins because he’s the good guy, the end. Not to give anything away.
The director is Walter Hill, who used to be pretty good. Even some of his bad movies like Bruce’s LAST MAN STANDING (a remake of either YOJIMBO or FIST FULL OF DOLLARS, I’m not sure) are good looking and semi-interesting. But this one is real uncinematic, it has a made for TV feel. It has lots of tired stylistic devices, like those annoying white flashes accompanied by whooshing sound effects, or those “computerized” titles that tell the names of the characters and what they’re in for as they appear. Like you care what the guy’s name is. Or lots of cutting to phoney TV interviews and news reports about Iceman. Look! Video! In the middle of a movie! How interesting and unique. Is it a commentary on the media and shit? Yeah, that must be what it is. And there are flashbacks of boxing matches that are in black and white even though they’re supposed to be from 5 or 10 years ago. (more…)
