Customer Reviews

Straight Out of Brooklyn [VHS]

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

George T. proves he can play gritty, tough street characters the way he portrayed Long Dong Silver in the biopic ''Silver Lining''. l found out that in the end of the movie when he is running from the drug dealers with Carl Lewis-like speed, that is was him and not a stunt double. Just like that was him and not a double in ''Silver Lining''. Just another example of George having not only style, but substance. You might say he has substantial substance.

What a man, what a man, what a might good man!

Matty Rich and the entire cast do a fine job here. Way better than Spike Lee's She's Gotta Have It--and with a lot more to say.

I have only one question: Why hasn't Matty Rich made more films?

yo yo, dis movie rocks big time. Dennis is the man!

"where did you get these beans?" great scene!

It doesn't get any more real than this! It shows the struggle that

so many families living in the projects go through. and how violence really doesn't solve your problems!

"yo, that is my GIRL" " I can get 30 guns, 10 for each of us!"

saab 9000 does 150 in first gear! wow!

don't miss this movie! it's one for the ages. Matty Rich rocks!

I like Mattie Rich. He is a very good Director. However, I never liked this movie. I entails too much on the point that there is no way out for the African - American of the 60's and 70's. True we don't have a great past, and true we are the only race since the days of Nebekenezer that was forced to another land just to be enslaved, but it is clear that there is always hope for freedom in every aspect of life. Straight Out Of Brooklyn is a lie.

Excellent screen play and performance by George T. Odom, as a Husband and Father who somehow missed out on the new opportunities of the Great Society; he's intelligent and so is his son, Dennis, played impressively by Lawrence Gilliard, Jr., who is not willing to settle for a gas station job; and a stop at the bar on the way home. Where a wife waits for psychological and sometimes physical abuse.

Dennis forgos his College education, so he and his two friends can go for the "easy money". He feels the System works that way...just on a larger scale. His view of Red Hook is that it is permanently in the shadow of Manhattan. Books can wait.

The Director makes the most of apparent location shots; and some supporting actors with marginal acting skills.

Overall, this movie, despite some rough edges and unreachable aspirations, is worthy of an Oscar, in the writing and acting department - the latter speaking of George T. Odom.

Viewed: 8/06, 10/10
Rate: 8

8/06: Oh yeah...Spike Lee is so jealous. Why? Because he knows he can't do it. Matty Rich proves him that any black director can make better films than Spike Lee regardless how much experience the black director has. John Singleton did it with Boyz n the Hood. Matty Rich does it again with Straight Out of Brooklyn. Also, a white director, Steve James, produced a powerful urban picture out of Hoop Dreams. What did Spike Lee do to rival with them? He makes crappy movies that go too far off the bat, especially dealing with racism. End of the discussion. Returning to Straight Out of Brooklyn, Matty Rich is absolutely brilliant and sensational in his directing debut. It is so unusually powerful picture, and what Matty Rich does is to bring back the feel of Italian Neo-Realism. There are so many aspects in Straight Out of Brooklyn that match what that era stood for during that time in Black communities up in northern cities. Simple story, non-professional actors, very low-budgeted picture, non-existential design sets, and a director with no prior education of how to make a film...really, this is basically a project type of a film. The result is? A mind-blowing picture that hits the very shred of reality that transform Straight Out of Brooklyn into a real-life film without any apocryphal Hollywood effects. In result, the film became the essence of Black Realism wave and is symbolic of the culture. Straight Out of Brooklyn is raw, uninhibited, and simple. Critics, some of them, declared Straight Out of Brooklyn oversimplistic. I declare them to be morons of movies. One of the most powerful black ghetto films, Straight Out of Brooklyn is a richly deserving picture that gets oft overlooked.

10/10: Dropping my rating from `10' to `8' for Straight Out of Brooklyn, I found the movie somewhat slow and lacking in substance. Surely, I really liked the realism used by Matty Rich to show how it is in Brooklyn back then and how these characters think and talk. The performances by everybody was excellent, no doubt about it. I found the build-up of the plot leading to the end to be somewhat disappointing. I wanted more out of it. In too many films, Spike Lee pretends to show that we have a problem with racism, and his films end up looking stupid and tiresome, but in Straight Out of Brooklyn, that was well done. Granted, Straight Out of Brooklyn is not up to par with Boyz n the Hood. All in all, Straight Out of Brooklyn was good for what it is and earned a respectable mention in black cinema. By the way Matty Rich was 17 when he wrote, produced, and directed the picture with only $450,000. It is a stunning achievement.

This is the movie that started it all for me. As a suburban white kid in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, I could still relate to these characters and this setting. From the opening moments of a busted up appartment (at the hands of 'Ray', the drunk-up pops) I was 'hooked on Redhook'. I have now seen it 13 times--more than any other movie. Matty Rich directed, wrote--done everything in this movie!
But you know? The show belongs to Dennis (Larry Gillard, Jr.) and Ray (George T. Odom--watch for him as the bartender in "The Hurricane"). When Ray's talkin' to the mirror... i'm feelin it.
I liked this movie so much, me and my boy was gonna do a remake of it, but it never happened... maybe one day...
Highlights of the movie include the scene where Dennis and Ray chat about life, forgotten dreams, and gettin OUT... also watch for the love scene with Sherley (which is sure to steam up your goggles) and the dance sequence where Dennis shows his moves with those crazy nut-caeshe friends of his.
You can't step to this movie. Now turn the lights down low, the volume full blast, and hit that owl like it was a party horn.

I noticed most of the cast didn't go on to other things, but this movie was ok. Even though, it came first, but it is sort of a "Menace II Society" wannabe. Not a great movie, but decent if you want drama.

The fact that this won an award at Sundance just proves how dumb the "liberal desire" is; just because a film (or book or play) displays "grit" does not equate the work with quality much less incisiveness. Rather, isolated liberals, so eager to prove that "they like black people," or that "I have a friend who's..." but meanwhile would NEVER entertain the thought of their daughters marrying a black guy.

One reviewer pointed to "Menace II Society" as a superior film, and I couldn't agree more. That's because - in large part - the Hughes brothers are superior filmmakers. Rich relies instead on hackish performances and obvious tropes of the inner city, complete with plaintive, obvious wailings about how stressful living in the hood is.

We know that, Matty.

With not an original idea in his head much less an artistic bent, Rich is reduced to stealing and stating the obvious in his naive kid manner. Bill Russell once said that blacks live in a world where they must understand white people, but white people have the luxury of never understanding blacks (or Asians, Latinos, Natives...). "Straight Out of Brooklyn" - whose title Rich further copped from NWA's "Straight Outta Compton" - hides behind its "grittiness" and comes off as a primer on black inner city life for white folks. It's those very folks, unfortunately, who by and large attend and run Sundance that are fooled because of their lack of experience.