Knights of the City

This hard to find 1986 movie where rappers are gangsters trying be fo gooders was cheesy even for the 80s. I was a kid during the breakdancing, rapping, hey day movies of Breakin, Rappin, Beat Street, Krush Groove, and forgotten film of Lorenzo Lamas-Body Rock. Back then street dancers like Shabba Doo and Boogaloo Shrimp set a pretty good tone for these kind of movies with Breakin. After that producers went crazy offering every goofy looking rapper a movie deal. This was one of them and by far one of the goofiest.

I was a fan of the Fat Boys and remember renting this on video. I remember I tried to like it, I wanted to like it, but man this movie was just stupid. Rappers as gang members trying get a record deal break out into song and dance. There really is no plot to this movie but an excuse to capitalize on the hip hop popularity of more superior music movies. Breakin opens and makes 40 million on a 1 million dollar budget so every studio wanted that same success.

Like I said, nothing happens here just rappers playing gang members performing songs. Theres a sort of back story of crime from an ex inmate producer but I've seen betting acting in six grade Christmas plays. This was cheesy in 86 and ever hilarious in 2024.

My review was written in February 1986 after a screening at Harris theater on Manhattan's 42nd St.

"Knights of the City" is a silly mishmash filmed in South Florida two years ago under the title "Cry of the City" (retained as a theme song). Filmmaker-star Leon Isaac Kennedy attempts to mix elements from the youth gang pics of the late 1970s with the recently demised ("Beat Street", "Flash Forward") genre of dance/rap music contests. Hokey result, picked up by New World, is yet another dud ready to line the shelves of home video stores.

Pic gained some notoriety when its production company, Miami Gold (not credited on screen in release print) left Florida after much local ballyhoo and exec producer Michael Franzese was later charged by the feds with racketeering and allegedly using his film companies to launder funds.

With new producers, music and post-production changes, pic emerges as a diffuse tale of three urban gang members (setting is indeterminate despite Florida lensing) played by Kennedy, John Mengati and Nicholas Campbell, at war with a rival gang, The Mechanix, led by Jeff Moldovan, that is invading their turf. Kennedy and Mengati also head up a musical group, which looks like their ticket out of the ghetto when they are briefly befriended in jail by drunk record company owner Michael Ansara.

Kennedy crosses both the color line and social classes by romancing Ansara's daughter, statuesque Janine Turner (named Brooke here and styled after Brooke Shields), who, a la "Flash Forward", organizes a street talent contest. After being coached in the latest dance steps by (fellow ex-Clevelander) Jeff Kutash, Kennedy & crew win the $10,000 prize and a recording contract, even though their much-applauded performance is pretty bad.

Campbell is a hardliner who wants to keep the gang together, and there is some chummy solidarity in the final reel when the good guys unite to wipe the floor with The Mechanix.

Filmed by director Dominic Orlando with too much back lighting and smoke machine effects, pic is padded with quickie turns by numerous guest stars from the music world, including Smokey Robinson as the contest emcee. Sammy Davis Jr.'s stint ended up on the cutting room floor, however.

Kutash's choreography is unimpressive and pic's musical sequences never generate the excitement of such models as "Breakin'" or even New World's own "Body Rock". The hope to modernize a "West Side Story" format is stillborn because this is not a musical but rather an action pic, with interpolated musical performances.

Campbell wins the overacting honors with a strident, screaming act, while his future teammate on tv's "The Insiders" series, Stoney Jackson, has little to do as the group/gang's drummer. Kennedy's script is extremely self-serving, unbelievably adding to his screen persona as "a lover and a fighter" the status of rap singer.

I was shocked to see the low rating of this movie. It's a really cool 80s movie. I didn't see all of it, but it actually looks just as good as The Warriors, and clearly Michael Jackson was inspired by this (or vice versa). It looks exactly like the stuff from Beat it and Bad. Of course, also other cool 80s movies. It really has all the kitch-value. I wonder why this movie is so little known. I had not heard about it either, until I saw it tonight. Anyway, it is very good, with some great music and action. Clearly this is an excellent description of the rap and hip-hop environment in an urban environment in the 80s and in the USA.

Troy (Leon Isaac Kennedy) leads the tough street gang and rock band (!) called the Royal Rockers. Locked up one night after a brawl, they are heard by a record CEO (Michael Ansara) who is in the drunk tank and get offered a shot at the big time in a talent contest. As an added bonus, Troy begins to fall for the CEO's daughter Brooke (Janine Turner in her first lead), which the record exec doesn't approve of.

Shot as Cry of the City in Miami during 1984, this could easily have been Breakin' 3. Unfortunately for producer-writer-lead Kennedy, the film sat on the shelf for nearly two years before New World picked it up in November 1985 and put it in theaters in early 1986. Kennedy contends on his site that the studio cut down his masterpiece, but I'm not quite sure this could be considered that in any form. Truth is by the time this came out the breakdancing craze was pretty much dead. The film is pretty schizophrenic in nature - you have one moment where the band is performing a goofy song and the next they are engaged in violent gang activity. Perhaps the most interesting thing about it is that it was financed by former mafia kingpin Michael Franzese. This would be the penultimate leading role for Kennedy, who was best know for the Penitentiary series (he ended his leading man career with part three after this). Musical cameos include Kurtis Blow, The Fat Boys, Harry Wayne Casey (the K. C. of K. C. and the Sunshine Band), and Smokey Robinson. And because I know you are dying to know - yes, the band wins the talent contest.

One thing that I found rather strange in this movie is that everywhere you go, you can see people dancing. On dimly lit street corners, in alleys, everywhere! What's up with that???.