SUPERBAD ON DRUGS
Dope
Review by Paul Preston
There have been plenty of stories of the inner city in Los Angeles, but chances are you haven’t seen one quite like “Dope”.
Many have compared “Dope” to John Hughes, which would make it the second film this year mimicking some of the best parts of Hughes (I think “The Duff” is the other). But parts of “Dope” also wisely mimic The Hughes BROTHERS, too, in that the story involves nerds making their way through high school social hierarchies, but there’s an element of danger, too, that adds welcome authenticity.
Our hero Malcolm lives in a rough part of Inglewood known as “The Bottoms”, and it wouldn’t be authentic to show this area as anything other than dangerously unpredictable. Malcolm has a desire to go as far from this area as he can imagine – Harvard, but even his teachers don’t see him as having much of a chance, given where he comes from, a label Malcolm shrugs off as “cliché” (a shrug the movie shares).
But until he hears the results of his application to the Ivy League, he still has to survive high school, and he rolls with a group of punk bandmate fellow nerds Jib (played by the so-nice-to-see-again-after-“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Tony Revolori) and Diggy (Kiersey Clemons). They love ‘90s rap culture, Air Jordans and spend most of the day dodging school thugs who want their sneakers and bikes.
Malcolm’s search for a prom date leads him on a “Superbad”-like, only-in-L.A. adventure that starts at a drug dealer Dom’s birthday party and ends with guns, drugs and police chases. The pace is lightning-quick under the direction of Rick Famuyiwa (“Brown Sugar”) and the first half of the film especially flies along with hilarious dialogue and memorable characters. The second half gets a bit log-jammed with a drug-selling plot that takes over the story, but stay with it ‘cause the pay-off is right on target with the Malcolm we met at the beginning of the film.
Malcolm is played (or, wonderfully underplayed) by Shameik Moore, who you can really root for, which is why I really wanted him to come out from under the mess of a downward spiral he found himself in after the Dom’s birthday party. In doing so, he shatters preconceived notions about inner city youth (a shattering the movie shares).
Dom is played by ASAP Rocky in another great example of real-life rappers excelling as actors. Rock stars have struggled with transitioning to the big screen for years, but for some reason, rappers pull it off more often than not.
Be prepared if you have virgin ears, the N-word is thrown around loose and fast in Malcolm’s world, but it provides believability while having fun (two notions the movie shares).
Directed by: Rick Famuyiwa
Release Date: June 19, 2015
Run Time: 103 Minutes
Country: USA
Rated: R
Distributor: Open Road Films
