Straight Outta Compton - The Motion Picture

Dre's never displayed the requisite humility/contrition/penchant for self-examination that would make him OK scenes in the movie of him being a woman-beating misogynist, I expect it would undermine his character's ability to function as a likable protagonist

I still liked it, I just felt like the movie became decidedly less interesting once they finished the part where Dre left the group. Pacing slowed way down, Cube disappears for far too long, Dre's scenes get broad-strokey, etc.

Regarding the stuff about Dre's woman-beating -- yes, I've read this many places. I heard there was a 3.5 hour edit of this that may become part of a director's cut, and that was to include more details about Dre's relationships.

That seems a touch on the wish-fulfillment side, honestly.

regardless of length, Dee Barnes detail is one that could have (and should have) been included, considering some of the unnecessary stuff that was touched on in the last hour. I got a little annoyed how Dre was portrayed as the "white knight" amongst Death Row, as if he wasn't caught up in it himself for a little while.

Also Dominique, more to the point perhaps, are you SURE you want to dismiss it all that way when the subject of said notorious assault just published an explicit piece referencing that as well as the film's director's involvement?

I found it v lol that Dre came off as the sensitive gentle "just in it for the music" dude

like oooookay

Regarding the stuff about Dre's woman-beating --

I understand the film also leaves out Eazy's woman-beating -- but does it take a firm position one way or the other on his potential pussy-eating?

he's actually portrayed as an amphibious creature without genitalia

I had a friend who knew Eazy-E pre-fame and she said he was a total sweet, funny guy (oddly). She was sorta nuts herself but eh who isnt

being a sweet and funny guy would sure help him get laid as much as he did, so idk that that is odd necessarily? can still be that and a gat totin hardass etc

yeah but according to that one lady on "8-Ball" his breath smelled

lool

I'm watching this tomorrow. I'll settle the matter.

Cool thx!

I dug this piece. Grantland's Wesley Morris wrote about his history with the band and how disappointed he is with what the movie is vs what it could have been:

http://grantland.com/hollywood-prospectus/straight-outta-compton-review-ice-cube-dr-dre/

The breakdown of the group produces the occasional LOL moment, like when Ice Cube’s wife, Kimberly Woodruff (Alexandra Shipp), hears that Eazy called her husband “Benedict Arnold” on N.W.A’s “Message to B.A.” and asks, “Is he trying to call you a traitor?” Which is almost like having a female character in a football movie inquire as to what a touchdown is.

[...]

But the most distressing LAPD run-in happens during a recording session in beachy Torrance, a city just south and west of Compton with scarcely a black resident. The guys have broken for lunch when a handful of cops descend upon them. The suddenness of the takedown is clumsily staged, but Gray maintains his composure, and the boldness sticks with you. The presiding officer is black and speaks to Dre and Eazy and the gang with the hateful disregard typically used in the movies by white officers. The power of the encounter comes at you from all sides. Heller’s outrage feels like disillusionment. He really can’t understand what’s happening. He sees his partners stomach-down on the pavement, and it hurts him. He tells the officer that these young men are artists — rappers — to which the cop replies that rap’s not an art. It’s the exact opposite racial position in which Giamatti found himself in 12 Years a Slave, where the trader he played acquired and sold black bodies with cold-blooded hauteur. Here he’s seething over their mistreatment, and it’s the rare example the movies have in which white people’s speaking on behalf of black people rocks you — because when these black men try to speak for themselves, no one’s listening. You know what “eureka” songwriting moment that confrontation will produce, and you can’t wait to see it happen. You crave the anger and defiance of that song.

Also Dominique, more to the point perhaps, are you SURE you want to dismiss it all that way when the subject of said notorious assault just published an explicit piece referencing that as well as the film's director's involvement?

Hey Ned, not dismissing! Just that I read that part of Dre could show up in a director's cut. Who knows tho...

I also remember the Benedict Arnold line, and thought it was unnecessary. *I* thought it was unnecessary, but chalked it up to this movie (like a LOT of others) being made for a general audience, and the fact that some high school kid might not actually know who Benedict Arnold is. That's the thing -- I'm not saying "writing down" in this way is right for films, it just happens so much, it's almost like a convention I have to accept in Hollywood movies if I want to enjoy anything.

Based on how dre has been described to be represented in the film, going to be very surprised if his violent assault of dee Barnes was filmed but cut for time. And even if it was, that's still something that's more than valid to critique.

I'll be the third person in this thread to rep for Wesley Morris's Grantland review which is not only absolutely dead-on about the movie's shortfalls and victories, it's also some the most perceptive writing about N.W.A's music and its ambiguous legacy that I've ever read.

"I heard there was a 3.5 hour edit of this that may become part of a director's cut, and that was to include more details about Dre's relationships."

'now with extra domestic violence!'

i wouldnt hold my breath for a directors cut. im still waiting on a django unchained and spike lee oldboy directors cut.

all biopics suck in some way, anyway. cant imagine this being any different. esp as its about NWA. its trying to give a group with THAT name and THOSE songs the same treatment as elvis and brian wilson (love and mercy is one of the best music biopics ive seen though, fwiw.. maybe a future nwa biopic will look at dre's life from when he was in nwa and hitting women to when he was under suge knights power and trying to leave death row)

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/22/arts/music/dr-dre-apologizes-to-the-women-ive-hurt.html?_r=0

It is an apology, true. But this is what you need to read:

In interviews with The Times this week, the women at the center of the allegations — the hip-hop journalist Dee Barnes; Michel’le, an R&B singer and Dr. Dre’s former girlfriend; and Tairrie B, a onetime labelmate — spoke about the abuse and about how social media had helped them connect and spread their stories.

“I’ve been talking about my abuse for many, many years, but it has not gotten any ears until now,” said Michel’le, who was romantically involved with Dr. Dre from the late-’80s until the mid-’90s. (They have an adult son.)

During that time, she said, he was often physically abusive, hitting her with a closed fist and leaving “black eyes, a cracked rib and scars.” Michel’le said she never pressed charges because, “We don’t get that kind of education in my culture.”

Advertisement
Continue reading the main story

She added, “Opening up and finding out there were other women like me gave me the power to speak up.”

Tairrie B (her real name is Theresa Murphy) said that Dr. Dre punched her twice in the face at a Grammys after-party in 1990 after she recorded a track insulting him.

She connected with Ms. Barnes through Facebook last year. “I said, ‘Hey girl, I think we have something in common, and we’ve never talked about it,’ ” Ms. Murphy said.

Ms. Barnes recalled being brought to tears by that message and a subsequent hourslong phone conversation with Ms. Murphy. Both women were writing memoirs — Ms. Barnes’s is tentatively titled “Music, Myth and Misogyny” — but did not expect to wage a public campaign against Dr. Dre, she said.

“The initial conversation was like group therapy, to heal our wounds,” Ms. Barnes said.

Separately:

http://www.newsweek.com/straight-outta-compton-dr-dre-364650

On Wednesday, Michel'le (born Michel'le Toussaint) spoke to Newsweek about the violence she says she suffered at Dre's hands in a different, domestic context. "What he did to her and what he did to me are two different things," Michel'le said. "I was his fiancée." Michel'le spent much of the early 1990s in a relationship with the rapper and former N.W.A member, performed on Death Row Records releases and had a son with the rapper in 1991.

"He told me he loved me, so I don't think I understood it, but he was abusive, mentally and physically," Michel'le said. "I didn't know any better, because my father never told me he loved me. When you find a guy that wants to be with you all the time, you think that's love, right? I had to make my own world."

Michel'le alleges that during their relationship, Dre kicked her and broke her ribs, injuring her in such a way that her ribs didn't heal properly and leaving a lump on the left side of her body that won't go away. She says he sent her to the hospital on at least one occasion during this period.

Standard biopic stuff given urgency by contemporary politics, but if anything I loved the music even more this time around. NWA and Cube've always been blind spots, but every musical cue had me dancing in my seat.

O'Shea Jackson, Jr.'s a better Cube than Cube himself.

Ppl I work with are v uptight abt NWA & their effing off the police ("i dont approve of their message" blah blah coded racism etc)

They just laugh when I try to tell them how much I love it. Dre had mad beats, you can dance to all of it! You would not believe the side-eye i got for saying you can dance to Fuck Tha Police lol

xpost cube was better looking

do any other rappers show up? do they watch an mc hammer video and go "smh...rap is over" or anything

yeah they all go to a Snow concert together

Luke shows up and they have a slap fight

Tim Dog's video comes on and they all watch it, then Ren says, "Wait a minute, is he saying he doesn't care for Compton?!"

hahaha

"what up Snoop"
'man I'm tryin to write those lyrics you asked me for, y'know, to take it to those mark ass bitches Eazy, Tim Dog, and Luke....but i'm stuck'
"well tell me what you got"
'your bark was loud and your bite wasn't vicious, but those rhymes you were kickin were just....I can't find a good rhyme there. it's the only line I can't finish'

(someone from outside Death Row soundbooth screams "damn, dogg, yo breath smells quite bootylicious..."

Dre and Snoop high five

"but what we gonna call the song, dog?"

(secretary runs in)

'the fuck is this, Dre Day? I'm sick and tired of taking down messages for you - tell your bitches not to call during business hours'

Dre and Snoop high five

someone should tell that screenwriter the song isn't named "Dre day"

the radio edit was!

that's why I was so confused when years later when I bought the Chronic..."wtf is 'Fuck with Dre Day (and everybody's celebrating)'"?

cube and dre in a studio

"you know who i love? that juliette lewis"

"she is a delight! we should name a song after one of her movies"

"but which one? husbands and wives?"

"nah...christmas vacation?"

"that's a possibility...kalifornia?"

*cut to phantom planet lurking in the hallway*

"california eh?"

/custos

unless he changed his screen name it's been about 9 years since that dude posted on ilx. i wonder if post-'06 folks even know what "custos" means

either they don't know, don't show, or don't care about what went on on greenspun.com

Lol

On the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart dated Sept. 5, N.W.A notches its first top 40 hit, as “Straight Outta Compton” debuts at No. 38 (the survey's highest debut of the week). It’s not only the first top 40 hit for the act, but its first Hot 100 entry ever. Although first released in 1988, “Compton” is allowed to enter this week's Hot 100, as older songs are eligible to chart if ranking in the top 50 and showing notable gains in sales, streaming and/or airplay.

The bow is spurred by publicity generated by the hit film of the same name, which bowed in theaters on Aug. 14 and has earned $111.1 million at the U.S. and Canada box office through Aug. 23. The song sold 35,000 downloads in the week ending Aug. 20 (up 127 percent compared to the previous week) and tallied 5.7 million domestic streams (up 123 percent), according to Nielsen Music.

The track also debuts at No. 7 on Rap Streaming Songs, No. 9 on Hot Rap Songs, No. 11 on R&B/Hip-Hop Streaming Songs, No. 13 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs and No. 20 on the overall Streaming Songs chart.

On Hot Rap Songs and Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, N.W.A also collects a debut with “F**k Tha Police” (also released in 1988), which bows at Nos. 20 and 25 on the lists, respectively.

N.W.A member Eazy-E also scores his third Hot 100 hit, as “Boyz-N-The-Hood” (from 1987) debuts at No. 50. It also launches at No. 14 on Hot Rap Songs and No. 18 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. It immediately becomes Eazy’s highest-charting single on the latter tally, surpassing the No. 30 peak of “Just Tah Let U Know” in 1995.

Posted for giggles, and for the use of the word "ruffian"

http://www.wsj.com/articles/gangsta-raps-grim-legacy-for-comptons-everywhere-1440542382

Or the gawker summary, for those not wanting to visit the WSJ:

http://gawker.com/the-republican-view-of-straight-outta-compton-black-h-1726623097

http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150826/rogers-park/did-police-arrest-juvenile-for-rapping-nwa-lyrics-at-them-video

"feel the groove, bust a move/this is somethin' 2 dance 2"
*cop starts breakdancing*

really thought that was going to be about Juvenile

fav moment was when Paul giamati spazzed out at ice cube saying Jew on the diss track

this got waaay too drawn out and boring by the end, the whole eazy-e trying to get the band back together part felt endless. but obvs some great scenes

Yeah, but it's not like there's exactly some neat bow to the NWA story that you could have tied this up with.

OTM to everyone who mentioned the hilarious on-the-nose namechecks of their successful songs and projects. My personal favorite was later in the film:

*Cube laughing hysterically at a computer screen*

Kim: How's Friday coming honey?

Cube: I'm at page 100, but I don't think I'm gonna go much further. Shit's hilarious!

Then again I did really enjoy the film, especially the first hour and a half or so, up until Cube busts up the record company guy's office. It got a bit draggy in the end.

I posted this upthread, but I loved the Friday thing because it really felt like a producer's note from Cube to let people know he wrote Friday.

I also like that the last 45 minutes of the movie for Cube is all cozy domesticity. I'm sure he was actually working really hard during that time to turn his acting career into something lasting, but in Straight Outta Compton his last few scenes are basically, "Then I settled into being famous forever..."