Boyz n the Hood Reviews

John Singleton's Boyz n the Hood remains one of the best fictionalized and most poignant summaries of some of America's toughest internal problems - racism, violence, poverty, and drug abuse. This is not a hip-hop film, nor a detached and dehumanized story about "gang violence" (the great over-simplified scapegoat of the issues treated in this film), its a story about growing up fatherless or motherless in a war zone with a faceless enemy, where people do not value each other's lives at all and value their own lives only slightly more.

Laurence Fishburn leads one of the best casts of the early 1990s, in his memorable portrayal of Furious Styles, a father trying to raise his son (Cuba Gooding Jr) well in an environment where murder and substance abuse are day-to-day realities - South Central L.A. The film follows his son, Tre, and his friends, from the hardships of childhood in an irrelevant educational system and a neighborhood which doesn't allow kids to be kids, through to the realities of making decisions about the value of life and the development of responsibility and hope as young adults.

The cast disappears into their characters and brings each one to life in a unique and powerful way. losing the identities of big personalities like Fishburne and Ice Cube is no mean feat. Many of the performances recorded here are award-worthy - Fishburne, Bassett, Chesnutt, Gooding, and Ice Cube are especially memorable. For me personally, this is the film that convinced me that Ice Cube was destined to become a major personality in American cinema. While I had enjoyed some of his music prior to this film, it was here that I was first exposed to his versatility and intelligence as an actor.

While some may see some of the film's messages as heavy-handed, and others might have issues with the fact that the film deals with so many of the problems of inner-city life in a very 'in-your-face' almost archetypal manner, I find these criticisms impossible to justify.

This is a great film about real issues, sensitively portrayed and thoughtfully examined. Every American who cares about the vast untapped potential of our people ought to take a long, hard look at this one. These are not 'black problems', they are everybody's problems, and their solutions will require everybody's understanding. I could think of far worse places to begin developing that understanding than Boyz n the Hood.

This is an extremely powerful film that digs far deeper into the root origins of this cycle of systemic racism and apartheid that hurts black communities.

I already saw this movie but, since it was a while back, I was quite eager to check it out again. There was a time, in the 90’s, when there was some kind of wave of movies dealing with the black ghettos in the US, it was called the ‘hood’ genre, and, from all these movies, this must be the most famous one they made. In fact, in this genre, I always preferred ‘Menace II Society’ which was even bleaker but there is no doubt that this movie was really good as well. Indeed, it was a realistic and heartbreaking take on the harsh reality of living in one of these neighborhoods, something that didn’t much change during the following 25 years, I’m afraid. While rewatching this movie, I was actually impressed by how complex all the characters were. Sure, the whole thing might be random without an actual plot but it didn’t bother me as it was basically a realistic slice of life in the hood. Back then, John Singleton became, at 24 years old, the youngest person ever to be nominated for the Best Director Academy Award and, even though many thought he had a bright future (including myself), his career turned out to be eventually only decent at best (for example, his last decent directing effort would be the rather lame ‘Abduction’ starring Taylor Lautner). Another disappointment was also the career of Cuba Gooding Jr. who would win an Academy Award 4 years later but, then, he would spend most of his time afterwards showing up in some really weak movies. Anyway, coming back to our main feature, 25 years later, it is still a powerful drama and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre. 

this movie is good and pretty kik ass and dipicts true life