Oscar fever is running high here in Los Angeles as illustrated
all over town: Tinseltown is an interesting name for Hollywood, but
perfectly suiting because in Hollywood no one decorates for
Christmas, but the whole town is decorated for the Oscars.
Oscar fever is running high here in Los Angeles as illustrated all over town: Tinseltown is an interesting name for Hollywood, but perfectly suiting because in Hollywood no one decorates for Christmas, but the whole town is decorated for the Oscars. This year, for the first time, the actual Oscar statues are on display in a glass cabinet in front of the Kodak Theater in downtown Hollywood. Let’s hope no one steals them.
Like little bees with Oscar buzz, the talk of the town is undoubtedly the Oscars and who will win for Best Picture this year. The perennial favorite seems to be Sophia Coppola’s “Lost in Translation,” but many are pulling for Peter Jackson’s six -years-in-the-making odyssey, “The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.”
“You Got Served”
(PG-13 for some violence and implied themes; 95 min.)
While this movie was enjoyable on a variety of levels, it still falls into the same category as most Hollywood films today: It has no point. Simply put, “You Got Served” with all of its electrifying dance moves, its hip-hop beat and its ghetto slang falls completely flat. The hip-hop “musical” film follows the journey of a “breaking” (for those of us not familiar with the term or with hip-hop culture this refers to break-dancing) crew of kids who struggle to survive in the ghettos of L.A. The two main characters David and Elgin (Omari Grandberry and Marques Houston) must resort to selling drugs in order to come up with enough money to be able to compete in these “street style” breaking competitions. “Borrowing” from the hit movie “Bring It On,” the white hip-hop kids from the Valley, who drive BMWs, challenge the black kids in the hood to a break-off, which then leads to a competition of who has the best breaking crew in L.A. Basically, the movie has an asinine plot with no point and no story, as the film is used as a showcase to feature members of the now defunct B2K hip-hop group.
I may not know my Ja-Rule from my Jay-Z, but I’ve got to say that while this movie lacked everything a film absolutely needs to even be considered a film, I was thoroughly entertained by the hilarity of even the most desperate situations.
Laughing at a child’s death is not at all kosher, but for this film when the child dies, I was laughing so hard I was in stitches. This film is so over the top and takes itself so seriously, that one cannot help but giggle at the horrible overacting, the lack of sets (there seem to be only four locations in this film and I know that there are more than four places to go in Los Angeles), and the fact that while this film is trying to present these youngsters as tough kids of the ghetto, there is no swearing, relatively low violence and the audience is never aware the boys are selling drugs: They carry around mysterious backpacks to various locales.
The film is incredibly racist as it tries to emulate some of the Blaxsplotation films of the 1970s by selling this as a black hip-hop movie, however all it does is play off of every imaginable black stereotype. Despite all of these criticisms, the moments in the film that actually featured dancing were mesmerizing. Living in Los Angeles, I see breaking quite a lot and the dance sequences by far were some of the best-choreographed and performed dancing sequences I have ever seen. If you need a good laugh or you are interested in breaking, I would see this film; otherwise if you want to see a good hip-hop film, see “Friday,” “Set It Off,” “8 Mile,” “Baby Boy” or even “Honey” (which just came out on DVD).
