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Directed by: Kevin Reynolds Starring: Samuel L. Jackson, Clifton Gonzalez Gonzalez Trevor Garfield (Samuel L. Jackson) is a battle-hardened teacher from New York. When a student shanks him a dozen times in the middle of a crowded campus hall as revenge for failing him, he takes a year off to recover from his injuries and relocates to Los Angeles. Once there, he resigns himself to substitute teaching for awhile. He is picked up for an extended assignment, but he soon finds that the new school isn't much better than his school back in New York. Gangs still rule the classrooms; they vandalize, mug, steal, rape, kill, and generally menace students and faculty alike. Throughout the movie, I was filled with an intense desire to see the under-18 cast members dead, so in that regard I guess it does a good job. The central player in all of this manifests itself in one Cesar Sanchez, whose continuing conflict with Garfield escalates into a violent and gripping conclusion. While I felt most of the characters were well-done, I will admit that there were a few occasions where I felt like I was watching an after-school special, in that some of the antagonists were like crude caricatures of the ilk they were supposed to portray. Luckily, this was usually regarding secondary characters that, more often than not, were never seen on camera again. At the same time, however, I'm tempted to forgive the aforementioned flaws. I've never had a hand in producing a movie about the horrors of inner-city schools, but I imagine it's hard to avoid the trappings of having cliche "thugs" and "gangstas," when, obviously, the roles are at least partially grounded in reality. I recommend you give this movie a rental, if only for the always-cool Sam Jackson. RATING: 4.5 PROS: most of the acting is good, Massive Attack in the soundtrack CONS: some of the kids' acting is poor enough to detract ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118531/
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Aug 15, 2004 15:29
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| # ? Apr 24, 2024 21:40 |
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This movie was as bad as "The Fan." They share quite a few similarities beyond their suckage, as well: Both take a cool premise, and proceed to over-gritify the subject matter. Both have incredibly great actors (THE best actor in DeNiro's case?) completely unable to save the clusterfuck in which they were submerged. Both directors felt the need to toss in 30-second interludes with inappropriate music (in The Fan's case, Nine Inch Nails simply didn't fit into DeNiro's character, more for age reasons than anything else). The entire film was just an overdramatization of serious issues, and it seemed like they tried to cover too much. Jackson's character was incredibly likeable, and a few of the supporting cast created some notably good scenes (the girl he was teaching to write didn't overact). However, his nemesis was just a bad actor, and wasn't helped out with his lines ("Stupid indians!"). The lame imagery also didn't add anything. A vandalization scene included animal mutilation mostly for the sake of including it, rather than making a real point. The school was also terribly stereotypical, and the director managed to make his version of Watts feel about as big as the entirety of southern California. There are better movies that address these issues, but not any of them felt the need to go to the extreme 187 did, which might fool some people into thinking it's not a piece of poo poo. I'd recommend El Principal (takes itself far less seriously, but still delivers a decent message) or Lean on Me (Morgan Freeman > Sam Jackson, but it was more of a class warfare movie and less of an "OMG GANG" movie). 1.0/5
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Aug 15, 2004 21:24
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