Style Wars

While searching my video shop for Hip Hop movies I came across this film. Having not heard of it before and the fact that it was a 70 minute documentary made me a bit skeptic about hiring it, but after reading a quote by Krs-One on the front cover saying it was what I had to see for true Hip Hop I was eager to get it out. It turned out to be a great documentary on graffiti and Hip Hop in the early eighties which I throughly enjoyed.

It was interesting to see how mixed the scene was race wise back then. This could be quite funny at times, like seeing a hardcore subway graffiti artist with a tight Van Halen t-shirt on and long red hair. This showed that graffiti, DJing, breaking and MCing weren't all considered Hip Hop back then. To do one didn't mean you were into the other.

Style Wars makes you understand the pride and enjoyment the artists get out of bombing trains, but you also realize how awful it is for the government to replace or clean trains and especially how bad it is for one bomber's mother.

Style Wars is primarily a documentary on graffiti but it also briefly touches on breaking and MCing. Funny that it doesn't mention DJing as a main part of Hip Hop, since that is considered the original and sometimes most important element these days.

Overall, Style Wars is a fantastic documentary and a must see for fans of Graffiti and early Hip Hop.

I was curious to see how this film played for me because to some degree I am target audience while also not being target audience. I love hip hop (and no, 50 Cent does not fit that category for me so much as Black Star, for example, would) and I like the culture around it of break-dancing and graffiti writing. However on the flip side I do see graffiti on public property (or others' property) as being a nuisance and part of dragging areas down by giving the impression of lawlessness and a lack of safety. Whether it is true that it does encourage crime, it is of little doubt that the clean and well-lit subway stations of modern New York feel a lot less threatening than the ones that you see in this film.

The film does a good job of showing both sides of argument and, although the focus is the cultural side, it doesn't play down the fact that the graffiti is both creative and a nuisance and that it is possible to see it both ways at the same time. Here we see some great pieces on trains and walls but we also see idiots like Cap who literally spray their names on top of other peoples' work, the former producing some imaginative work that does make the "art" claim fly, the latter very much demonstrating the criminal damage side of it. The contributions from the bombers or taggers are mostly good, with plenty of typically Noo Yark characters of all ages and races talking with an energy and passion on the subject as it was happening.

The link to break-dancing and hip hop is not as strongly made as I would have liked and it doesn't manage to explore the birth of this street culture as well as I would have hoped. That said though it is still interesting to see a documentary about the graffiti trend and have captured it as it was in its heyday before it was stamped out. The film doesn't pander to either side but clearly sides with those being creative and allows the quality of the work to shine through, mostly ignoring those who would just seek to quickly spray their names on a train with nothing else to offer.

Not as culturally important as I would have liked it to have been but nonetheless interesting and cool at the same time and well worth seeing for the real heads.

'They call themselves writers because that's what they do. They write their names among other things everywhere. Names they've been given or have chosen for themselves. Most of all they write in and on subway trains, which carry their names from one end of the city to the other. It's called bombing. And it has equally assertive counterparts in rap music and break dancing'. According to Tony Silver, the maker of this documentary film on graffiti and hip hop culture.

Back in the days when many neighborhoods in New York were still a crumbling wasteland, Major Koch (of course!) and the city workers responsible for the city's clean-up provide most of the laughs. One tormented Transport Authority official keeps complaining that the substance used to remove the paint also fogs the windows. A difficult choice. Either not getting a view from the windows because of the graffiti or because of the cleaning substance that fogs the windows.

And what about that cheesy ad campaign with Hector Camacho and Alex Ramos? 'Take it from the champs, graffiti is for chumps. Make your mark in society, not on society'.

And then in the press conference preceding the campaign.

'Mr mayor, are those posters graffiti proof?'

'Time will tell!'

Camacho and Ramos must be scratching the back of their heads by now. Many of the writers they agitated against have become legends by now but who remembers these two chumps?

It's hard to imagine the airwaves this caused when it first reached Europe. I think it was in 1985 when it first aired in the Netherlands and France and many other countries as well. Literally within months after this documentary was shown, cities like Amsterdam and Paris where bombed in a way they've never experienced before. Graffiti had made its mark, mostly by early pioneers that had their roots in the punk-scene, but after STYLE WARS the scene literally exploded and saw the beginning of hip hop culture in Europe as well. I think it's important to realize this film was much more influential in Europe. In the States it was the first major documentary on graffiti, but of a phenomenon that had existed for quite some time there, but in Europe - besides the early punk scene - it was unknown in 1983 and caused a huge stir. I've seen it many times now, but it never bores me. It remains just as vivid today as the first I saw it and it's subsequent historical significance just adds to the flavour when watching it again.

The film is packed with so many memorable moments, it's hard to pick one out. One of the most mesmerizing scenes is when three writers hang around at a subway station on the platform and start rapping on the rhymes from "The Message", by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. After 30 seconds the actual song starts on the background just as the train rolls in. An amazing shot and a fantastic piece of editing, a wonderful scene! If there's anything like THE quintessential shot of New York City subcultures in 1982, this is it.

Now the much needed DVD-release is there, given the deluxe treatment by Public Art Films with two discs and lots of extras. I could have done without the interview with Tony Silver, not the most charismatic person around but most of the other stuff is OK with lost of artist galleries, tributes to DONDI and SHY 147 and lots of guest interviews with Fab 5 Freddy, Goldie, Guru, DJ Red Alert and photographer Martha Cooper.

Camera Obscura --- 9/10

I've just been browsing the comments of the Old skool hip hop classics like Beat Street, Wildstyle etc when I thought I would take a look at this one. Which is by far the best. I was surprised at the lack of comments as this really is a great in depth look at New York, at a time when the city was an exciting bubbling cauldron of sub culture. All before it was turned into a mass marketed commercial fabrication cashed in on by various corporations.

The likes of Seen, Skeme, IztheWiz, kase2 amongst others give memorable dialogue and insights to their experiences. All of which very well pitched up against Mayor Koch and various Subway transit authority representatives pitching their political and social prerogatives against the Graffiti writers exploits. The cornerstone to this documentary ever being made was Henry Chalfant whom befriended and sympathetically documented the writer's work for many years. I recall that the documentary actually won an award of some description but looking over the box sleeve I can't find the details of this. Also worth noting is that the recent release contains an extra 10 minutes of previously unseen footage.

I noticed that there are no links on this site to purchase it but it is easily acquired. I recommend a trip to a local comic shop or the like and pick up one of many Graffiti art magazine publications. You will find it for sale in any one of those. If you are particularly keen on this subject matter you might also want to hunt down a book by 'Craig Castleman' called 'Getting up' for a more in depth if not visual account. The fourth coming release of Downtown '81 might also be worth a look for the real fans of this genre.

Through various publications I have read of many of the featured writers in Style Wars, still around and making their mark in the world of Graffiti. The one writer that I haven't personally heard about since' is Skeme. For me his contribution to the documentary invoked a lot of admiration, due to his blunt honesty and purist ethics. I have read that Henry Chalfont has no intentions to make any follow up documentary on the basis that home grown publications and videos are already achieving this. Personally and i am sure many agree with me, this is a story that many would like to see continued and whom better to tell it than Henry himself.

This documentary on subway grafitti in New York City in the early 1980s had it all: it was beautifully shot, had a great soundtrack, and captured the essence of what was going on in the city after the 70s and under the regime of Mayor Kotch. The best thing about this documentary is how it can be studied on so many levels- it makes you realize why "bombing" is done and what it accomplishes. It helps you understand the psychological reasoning behind it, and how it plays on human character traits such as territorial rights, pursuit and the need for recognition. It shows how graffitti had a strong impact on society, and how it tore some homes apart. A must see- plus a great representation of early hip hop music and style. Love those TWAs! (Teeny Weeny Afros!) 9 out of 10.