South Central: O bairro proibido

SOuth Central was a gripping drama about a former gang member who has to decide between being a daddy and being a gangster. He rolls with the wrong crowd and gets caught up, BAD MOVE! NOt to spoil the film for those who haven't seen it I'll just leave it at that.

THe direction was fluid and well executed. S. Anderson brings the viewer into the scene and captures the moment with sheer brilliance. THe only two acting performances even worth mentioning were Glenn Plumber's and Byron Minns's. The supporting performances where sub-par but good writing rescued them from seeming cheezy.

I enjoyed South Central. It made my collection and I recommend it for yours.

BUggie

This movie is one of the best in this genre,I think of it among with "Boys N the hood" and "Menace to society". It shows how hard it can be to grow up in a bad neighborhood,and how easy drugs and criminal life takes over.

This movie makes you care about its characters. This should be said about all films, but this one accomplishes it where others do not. The story revolves around a young man in South Central Los Angeles who is involved in a gang that is slowly making itself successful by selling drugs. He goes to jail after being convicted of shooting another gang lord. While in prison, his son grows up and is drawn by the romance and easy money of his father's old gang, and becomes involved as well. The story is a little over-simplistic, and the dialogue is a bit thin at times. But the director and cast rise to the challenge and turn this into a film about relationships and philosophy, rather than going for the easy solution of shooting off as many guns as possible. The ending is one of the most sappy we've seen in a while (just a bit too much 'Mom and apple pie'), but given the situation you are willing to go with it. While it's not perfect, this film ultimately works -- which is better than 95% of this genre.

This movie was filmed around the time of the Rodney King riots that ripped South Central Los Angeles. Let's face it, the heart and soul of Los Angeles isn't Hollywood. It's the people like in this movie who try to make living, earnestly, honestly, and respectively. Sadly, this film is still realistic to the plight of urban problems. I spent a lot of time in one of the great urban cities of the East Coast and the problems of poverty, the lure of leading drug dealing lives is real and tempting, domestic violence, child abuse, gangs, etc. still exist and will exist much to the attempts of prevention or society ignoring their presence. Anyway, this film is truly about the heart and soul of a city of ten million Angelenos and the father's attempt to save his son from a life of crime, violence, death, and drugs in the city. It's not an easy battle.

I just wanna say that I caught the last hour of the movie, I have no idea how it started but I was watching the DVD lady Jane and I paused to see what's on TV and there it was, South Central, and I watched the part in prison where Ali defends his friend from the mob inside by giving them what they need from cigarettes and services in return to stay away from the black inmate. The encounter between Ali and boy's father where he describes what happened to his son was the most powerful scene I've seen in any movie, it brought me literarly to tears. Another strong scene was the final 5 minutes, I'll let you discover it for yourselves because you'll be blown away, I don't know why the rating is so low in quantity and in quality, I'm giving it a 9/10 for its strong performances and also a great theme where it touches the source of Black gang violence and how a small corrupted group can effect the whole community, on the other hand also how a corrupted gang member can also be saved by a strong willful cultured person like Ali.

Great Movie, a must see...