Notorious
Revisiting The B.I.G.sty
Trailers & Mo | Official Website
To some (including thighselves), hearing the title
Notorious will always conjure up images of
Cary Grant outwitting Nazis in South America while winning the love of Ingrid Bergman, and for everyone else w/o an appreciation for one the Master of Suspense's bestest films from his early Hollywood period (or who aint a fan of Duran Duran), it will apply to the film about the short but very productive life of one Christopher Wallace, aka Biggie Smalls, aka Big Poppa, aka The Notorious B.I.G. That life included ushering in NY's hip-hop's renaissance in the early 90s, battling wits and much more with West Coaster Tupac, and winning the love of millions and many women along the way. As a true life story, no one can touch the mystery and intrigue of Biggie's, but as a movie, Cary Grant and co. will retain the rights as the mos notorious
Notorious movie for all eternity (although both of them have nothing on
Gretchen Mol's thighopening performance in The Notorious Bettie Page). Not to say that hip-hop's first biopic isn't a crowd pleasing, hand swaying and head boppin' night at the movies, cause it certainly is, but had this by the numbers recount (purty much devoid of the mystery and intrigue) been helmed by someone with a lil more sensitivity and a dash mo flash and class than what
George Tillman Jr. handed in, then this trip down Biggie's Bed-Sty memory lane coulda ended up a lil more memorable, something along the lines of
Ray
Notorious goes down easy like drinking Gatorade, thanks in large part to the creditable acting performances by a bunch of nobodies, outside of
Derek Luke, who puts a bit of humility into Sean 'Puffy' Combs, a man who couldn't find humility even if he was looking at a dictionary that only contained the word 'humility'.
Jamal Woolard (aka
Gravy)'s struttin and rhyme flippin in his embodiment of B.I.G.'s big body is dead-on (poor choice of a pun, but then again all of our puns are usually a poor choice), and you don't even think for a second that he's acting. It's comes off as being completely natural, as is the work of Biggie's actual son
Christopher Jordan Wallace (who plays the young version of his poppa),
Naturi Naughton (getting dirty and being dirty as Lil Kim) and
Antonique Smith (keeping the Faith Evans). The ensemble effectively show us this Notorious figure's life and times, but the film as a whole doesn't necessarily breathe any new life after his death
Walk A Mile In His B.I.G. Shoes:
TONY mag has created
a DIY walking tour of Biggie's old haunts in Bed-StyNaughty Naughton:
yum, you is 
Verdictgo:
Jeepers Worth A PeepersDefianceDon't Bother With These Brothers In Arms Way
Trailers & Mo |
Official Website
Here we go again with
Edward Zwick's big camera and big lessons following the unyielding will of the underdog round the globe, past or present. It worked like a gangbusters gangbang with his
Glory and
Legends of the Fall, but every similar flick he's made since then is heavier on the guts than the glory.
The Last Samurai and
Blood Diamond were both big and bold, but boorish and cold juss the same.
Defiance falls in line with those last two, which makes this historical drama that partially covers the time line of the brothers Bielski (
Daniel Craig,
Liev Schreiber, and
Billy Elliot)
and their forest dwelling group of WWII Jewish freedom fighters (which led our friend to quip that this movie shoulda been called
The Swiss Family Epstein) a
crying defying shame. Zwick can't decide if he wants his film to be as sobering as
Schindler's List or a Nazi shoot-em up fun fest like
The Dirty Dozen. We couldn't decide on whether to commend the actors for speaking in a poor quasi-Russian accent or to laff at em for trying the entire time. The only thing you need need to decide is to wait for the DVD, or don't even bother and juss rewatch
Munich, a much better Jews killing Jew-haters flick
Young Guns IIII: twas nice to see
In Treatment's
Mia Wasikowska on the big screen before she gets even bigger by playing Alice in Tim Butron's
Alice in Wonderland in 2010, but we wanna give a widethighs shout out to the fourth Bielski bro, played with bright eyes and an endless blank stare by lil
George MacKay. This kid looks eggzactly like a young
Roman Polanski, and we urge anyone who may be cinematically telling Polanksi's life story, to let him be the not so noble Roman. And while we're at it, let
NSFWer Diora Baird play his slain wife
Sharon Tate,
Michelle Williams play Mia Farrow,
Christian Slater play Jack and
Bob Odenkirk play Charles Manson
Verdictgo:
Sum Merit But No Stinkin BadgesNotorious and
Defiance are currently playing at a theater new Jews
and until next thyme the balcony is clothed...
