Réu Primário

This will be my first comment posting due to the fact that this is first time I felt the need to do so. I caught this movie somewhere towards the beginning and within 10 minutes it had pulled me in to the point where I could not step away. At first I thought it was going to be a "prison movie" but turned out to be so much more. When the boot camp sequence ended the movie just got better and better. Omar Epps was tremendous in this movie and actually had me caring about the character ,which never happens to me to the point that it did here. I felt that I was watching someones life story and not fiction,and it turned out I was right after signing on here. Omar made this movie very believable and I would recommend you see this movie. I will watch it again.

This TV movie is a bleak but insightful look at how a young black American copes with and ultimately benefits from being sent to a Boot Camp instead of prison. I did enjoy this movie as it took us into the dark and depressing life of a young African American but it could have been so much better. I would have liked the relationship with the two gang Bangers to have been explored a little bit more and we could also have done without the slushy sentimental bit in the middle of the film.

I had never heard of the actor Omar Epps and I was impresssed with him in the lead role. Over all a good movie. 7 out of 10.

More interesting than entertaining, "FTF" follows one inner-city street hood from his first time "bust" for drug dealing through one of the controversial "boot camp" style reform programs back into the streets where he is again faced with a choice between easy money or long unemployment lines. A journeyman film which runs a bit long with it's attempts to milk sympathy from the audience, "FTF" is a somewhat staged telling of a true story, a tour de force by a well cast Epps, and a seemingly serious attempt to give insights into the plight of the young inner-city black male with a criminal record.

A movie provides entertainment,FTF told a real story realistically. I missed the beginning credits so didn't know what it was about till I saw Epps and knew it couldn't be something ordinary.

First Time Felon doesn't rush along because its' story isn't one to be rushed, critics call it slow, I call it insightful.

The hood trying to give up his "hood" has a tough time because he's become a fencesitter in the eyes of all. He's not accepted by society for being honest about his conviction neither is he one of the boys because he's seen the end of that road and this is depicted harshly when Pookie is blown away right next to him, that could have been him and for a minute his own existence was in the balance.

Greg Yance's story is deeply moving in an "it could happen to you" kind of way and you get pulled in like one of the comments said, it holds you right through and I found myself rooting for Yance when he hit the streets again and again, his Mum's support was instrumental in keeping him going,I didn't find it mushy in the least.

Omar Epps is a multi talented actor who delivers every time. This is one of his finest performances till date.

A 7/10

I thought that this would be another preachy movie about black kids in jail and all their problems. I was wrong. This is about black kids will all sorts of problems in and out of jail but it is done very tightly and kept up my interest throughout. Omar Epps is getting a lot of well deserved credit for his acting but my thumbs up goes to the director Charles S. Dutton who I would like to see do other films. The music with the end credits was beautiful and sounded like the high class music that you hear with much bigger budget movies. I recommend that everyone see this movie once. You will not regret it.