Directed and Written by : Rick Famuyiwa
Starring : Shameik Moore, Kiersey Clemons, Tony Revolori, Zoë Kravitz,
Release Date : June 19, 2015
There's a lot of coming of age stories involving a kid that lives in a bad neighborhood, that has to rise to the occasion to be a good person surrounded by bad people. In the case of this movie, the "hood" here is the city of Inglewood (up to no good) California, but the main character is already a good person, who is put in a position where he'll need to do some bad things.
This is a fun movie, with some creative dialogue, fantastic soundtrack, and energetic visual storytelling that mixes in many modern stylings and pop culture. The fact that there are plot points that involves the "find my iPhone" functionality, memes, and bitcoins, may eventually date this film. However, the protagonists are outcast geeky kids who love '90s hip hop and are in a punk band, so this movie dating itself is just part of the enjoyment.
The whole cast here are great, but the main characters here are especially people to definitely root for. We find our loveable misfit group; Malcolm, Diggy, and Jib, encounter some outrageous situations, and colorful characters. It's entertaining to see how their young innocence mixed in with their cleverness, can cope with all the crazy stuff they get into in this movie.
While there's some cool inventiveness to how Director / Writer Famuyiwa did this movie, he isn't above using some cliche plot points, some self-awareness, and even some obviously preachy scenes. However, I found that the many things to like about "Dope" are numerous enough, that I can easily overlook the flaws that it does have. I liked this movie a lot.
lovedit ENJOYED IT itsokayitsmehitsterrible
