In which we close out the classic...at this point, I'm fed up with this film...
Remember, all clips are . You have been warned.
White cop just dropped stammerer three stories or so. Stammerer didn't, of course, die and is about to gun down Ice T until White cop shoots Stammerer from above.
Ice T smirks his approval.
'Cause he's like dat.
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Nino did say that if Ice T's character turned out not to be genuine, he would kill G-Money.
He did say that.
He did warn us.
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When Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell have a confrontation like Nino and G-Money are having on the riverside, there was four seasons of weight behind it. We had been through the wars with these characters. They had held each other up and betrayed each other in equal fashion.
When G-Money and Nino have the same conversation, there's a whole eighty-minutes of weight behind it.
I'll shut up about The Wire now.
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Wesley Snipes kissed G-Money.
I'm glad I don't kiss guys because clearly I would have to kill them if I did. That's what the movies have taught me.
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The shot that kills G-Money...
Oh, spoiler alert...
The shot that kills G-Money is the worst faked shot in the world. No recoil...no flash...no puff of smoke...no bullet wound...no recoil...no blood...just a sound effect and G-Money falling over saying 'doh'...
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Nino's still watching Scarface with the "never come between us" girl kissing around on him. Why can't he figure out that she's trouble?
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White Cop just climbed down from the roof and got the attention of the black bodyguard by saying, "Yo, Buckwheat."
I swear I am not making that up. Apparently Mario van Peebles thinks white people are all outwardly racist because every white character (there's White Cop and...um...) is outwardly racist but inwardly down with his bruthahs.
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Ice T swung into the window of Nino's apartment carrying the body of a different bodyguard as a human shield. That's brutal, man.
And strong...
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I want Nino's haircut - flat-top with a wide front-to-back ridge on top. It's like a stubby shark fin.
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Nino just got thrown out of the window onto the fire escape where it's dark. At least it's dark from inside the apartment. Outside, however, it's the middle of the day.
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Wise Old Black Man appears for the third time, watching Ice T beat the snot out of Nino.
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Ice T: "Man, that teacher you kill[ed]. That was my mother!"
I told you that was going to come back.
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Ice T's about to shoot Nino. He's clearly wigged out because he's making his whole face shake. It's kind of creepy (7:03 into the above clip).
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I can't quote Ice T's line at 7:10 because this blog is linked from my school page, but it's the best line in the whole movie.
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Suddenly Nino's deposed girlfriend is on the scene saying that she'll testify. Nice timing, chicka.
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White Cop reaches past Ice T to help Ice T take back the gun that's pointed at Nino.
White Cop is wearing bedazzled, fringed, black leather biker gloves. Clearly he and Ice T have an interesting relationship.
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Fifteen degree angles are back for the wrap-up. I'd really missed them.
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Why would Ice T show up to testify in court wearing sneakers, his Kangol hat, sunglasses, and a velour track suit?
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Nino's final soliloquy: "I'm not guilty; you're the one who's guilty: the lawmakers, the politicians, the Colombian drug lords...all you who lobby against making drugs legal....just like you did with alcohol during the prohibition. You're the one who is guilty. I mean, c'mon, let's kick [?] the ballistics here. Ain't no uzi's made in Harlem. I mean, not one of us in here owns a poppy field. This thing is bigger than Nino Brown. This is big business. This is the American way."
I'm still not quite clear how van Peebles feels about drugs.
Nino continues after being asked if he was the head of the CMB: "Yes. Yes, I was a member, but I was forced into this way of life. Hey look, I've been dealing drugs ever since I was twelve years old. See, I didn't have the chances that you had, Ms. Hawkins. I wasn't born with a silver spoon in my mouth, Ms. Hawkins. I wanted to get out, but they threatened to kill my mother."
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Nice...Nino is claiming that smart, middle-class black guy (the computer guy, the one who recognized Ice T) was the brains behind the CMB.
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Wise Old Black Man makes his final appearance, calling Nino an idolater.
See, he's bringing it full circle.
...and pulling otu a gun to shoot Nino...who then falls - theatrically - three stories while White Cop smiles and laughs and Ice T puts on his sunglasses.
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O'Jays, sing us out..."For the love of money..."
Nevermind, it's another remix with somebody rapping about how money ruings things.
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Words on the screen to make sure Van Peebles makes his point in case you missed it...
"Although this is a fictional story, there are Nino Browns in ever major city in America. If we don't confront the problem realistically -- without empty slogans and promises -- then drugs with continue to destroy our country.
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So, that's New Jack City. It's a spectacular time capsule of the early 1990's and an example of how to eschew all pretenses of subtlety in a movie.
Feel free to roll through the movie with us, but know that the clips are all . You have been warned.
If you're following along at home, we're 45:40 into the film or right at the start of the above clip.
Time has no meaning in this film. Pookie has been working in The Carter for like one scene, but now rich, upper class black guy (the computer expert and horrible actor) says..."You know, I told G-Money how good you been working out, right? And I told him how many customers you bringin' in. And you're just a lookout. ... We gonna get you a better position."
Apparently Pookie has been working there for a while even though the movie doesn't do anything else to suggest this is the case.
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Ice T and Asian cop both start screaming "yes, inside!" when Pookie gets taken to see G-Money (apparently the name of Velour suit). I guess this isn't police work but rather a college basketball game.
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Mario Van Peebles is carrying his baby in a front papoose walking the beach between cigarette dangling (not smoking, of course, just dangling) Judd Nelson white cop; African medallion, African fabric hatted, dreadlocked Ice T uber-black cop; and Pookie saying that he doesn't know if Pookie is ready for this.
Damn if this man isn't subtle.
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Wait, Ice T just revealed that a little junkie like Pookie killed his mother back in 1974. Mother wasn't in the game, just came up and shot her for no reason.
Remember that for about an hour from now when Nino tells a story about his first kill as a gang member.
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Pookie's back on the pipe.
He's beaming up to Scotty.
It took all of one scene for him to slide all the way back.
Seriously, if this were a season-long show, this would've worked because we would've gotten a couple of episodes with Pookie looking tempted then trying to resist and then finally giving in. Instead, we get "you owe a lot of people...don't screw it up" followed immediately by Pookie screwing it up.
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He's screwing it up wordlessly...with a massive, exaggerated look of anguish on his face and a wailing, electric guitar in the background.
If Dave Chapelle taught us anything, it's that white people love electric guitar. Why does Pookie have an electric guitar playing behind him?
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White cop just called Ice T "Superfly"...that's not racist.
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When asked if Pookie's odd actions (viewed through a James Bondian belt buckle tv camera) were a cry for help, White cop said "no, it's a black thing."
Ok, that might have been racist.
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At least White cop isn't a stereotype or anything.
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Pookie is about to blow it by revealing the belt buckle camera. Half an hour ago (in movie-watching time) he was coked out. Fifteen minutes ago he was rehabbed and got into the Carter. Now the undercover work is about to end.
Give this a full season done up right like The Wire because compressing it this much doesn't make a lick of sense.
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Wait, did G-Money really just say "What, you Five-Oh?"
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The CMB is prepared. They have dozens of gas cans all around to burn the computers right up. I am impressed with their organization.
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The cops come in guns a blazin, M16s firing, black hoods pulled over their faces, plastique blowing up the doors.
Where do they get all their fabulous toys?
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The computers which were just doused in gasoline and set on fire now seem to be totally unburned. Luckily the CMB ejected all the disks with the data on them so White cop couldn't find them.
Apparently the CMB were prepared but their gasoline didn't actually burn anything. That's just bad luck there.
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White cop knows how to defuse bombs - like the one strapped to Pookie's chest. Lucky that, eh?
Not that it matters because Pookie's dead.
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And Nino is in bed with the girl who would never come between him and G-Money.
She seems nice.
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Whoever gave Wesley Snipes the chain is a genius. He uses it as a dog leash then as a jump rope then as a garrote. I'm not actually joking about this; Wesley Snipe is really acting here, using the prop to his character's full advantage.
This may be the best scene in the movie.
And the line "Sit you five-dollar a$$ down before I make change." is outstanding.
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Nino just stabbed upper class computer black guy in the hand with a sword from his cane, nailing the hand to the table. I've wondered before just how easy it would be to stab somebody through the hand because you see it in movies all the time, and it doesn't seem to take much effort.
How likely would you be to hit bones and screw up the drama of the move?
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All of the flashy colors are gone from the wardrobes around the table now. Black tops, black slacks, black shoes. Apparently something went wrong.
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Wesley Snipe at 3:07 in the above clip nails the dismissal "leave me" of the emperor who is bored with the proceedings and wants to be left alone. I don't know why he would be bored at this point, but I love the line delivery none the less.
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G-Money has cracked. He's being filmed through a fish tank with the huge amounts of bubbles obscuring his face. He's delivering a soliloquy to a crack pipe. He's like some sort of demented MacBeth at this point.
I know when actors have to fake drinking beer they use apple juice. When they have to fake smoking tobacco they use cloves. When they have to fake smoking marijuana they use (I assume tobacco).
How do they fake freebasing crack?
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We've come full circle at Pookie's funeral. The minister is reading the lines from 1st Corinthians that were painted on the wall in the first scene (neither fornicators nor idolaters...shall inherit the Kingdom of God). That's beautiful symmetry...
...if this were the end of the movie. It's not. It's like fifty-eight minutes into a two-hour movie.
This should be the end of the first season.
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Why does one of the gravediggers have a metal hook for a hand? Is that a joke?
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Why does Mario Van Peebles's character have his tie untied at Pookie's funeral? Nobody else is going casual.
What decision did Van Peebles the director make to tell Van Peebles the actor that this was a good choice?
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Van Peebles says that he gambled on Ice T, and Ice T gambled on a crack head. Ice T starts to punch Van Peebles, but Judd Nelson stops him and says "that's enough, man".
What bonding crap have we missed to make this reasonable? Judd Nelson's character hates Ice T's. Judd Nelson's white cop has done nothing but mock the choice of Pookie the whole time.
Why the sudden flip?
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"Scottie, let it go, man. Operation's over...it's over."
For some reason, I'm actually thinking that it might not be over.
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Oh, wait. Ice T just came back with "it ain't over."
Oh, here's the bonding moment that apparently happened before hand. White cop and black cop are drinking together on a roof. Apparently Van Peebles is doing a Pulp Fiction and showing us scenes out of order.
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White cop delivers soliloquy #2...
"This whole drug s***...it's not a black thing and it's not a white thing. It's a death thing. Death doesn't give a s*** about color. [...] We're in this together now, partner."
Black cop retorts...
"You know, a drug dealer is the worst kind of brother, man. He won't sell it to his sister. He won't sell it to his mother, but he'll sell it to one of his boys on the street."
I wonder how Van Peebles feels about drugs.
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I love the "jump a guy in the alley but only show the confrontation in shadows against a wall" technique. That's not used enough. (7:15 in the above clip)
Where the heck is the light that bright shining into any alley to do that?
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Smooth, young Italian (who lost his ponytail earlier, who brought a lawn jockey with a noose to Nino) introduces G-Money to White cop and Black cop as drug dealers. Black cop has on a black, fur fedora and a leather duster that is resting on his shoulders, his arms not in the sleeves.
And G-Money trusts Italian guy because of why again?
Oh, and White cop doesn't say anything because he's "the main man".
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I love that it takes all of thirty seconds for Ice T to go undercover successfully.
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We're now in season two of the correctly paced television show New Jack City.
And the Italian smoothy called somebody and said "Nino is about it ich."
See, that's a reference to something that his Italian mobster leader said earlier.
You have to be paying attention to this movie, I tell ya.
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The CMB are now paying a tense game of one-on-one wearing slacks, dress shoes, and no shirts.
How times have changed.
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Van Peebles wisely chooses the subtle path in letting his message slip gently into the film again.
At 0:45 the camera pulls back to show this...
I wonder how Van Peebles feels about drugs.
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Upper class computer guy says he recognizes Ice T from somewhere. (remember the "well-dressed black man" who saw Ice T shoot Pookie and on whose face we flashed three separate times?)
Subtlety, thy name is Van Peebles.
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G-Money is supposedly buying drugs 60% cheaper from Ice T.
Um, where are the cops getting all the drugs to sell?
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Nino and Ice T are sharing a moment on the roof at night.
No, not that kind of a moment. It's a bonding moment like White cop and Black cop had a few scenes ago.
Nino is telling a story about his first time killing someone for a gang.
I was wrong. You can stop thinking about Ice T's mother dying now.
It was Nino who killed Ice T's mom.
Isn't that a tragic coincidence?
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Wise old black man is back for his second appearance.
He points out that Nino is an idol worshiper, an idolater.
Where have we heard something about that before?
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This time the old man has a gun and draws it on Nino before Ice T takes the gun away to save Nino's life.
Ice T is conflicted.
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Nino is hosting a wedding at a public park...in the daytime.
Bright, sunshiny daytime.
At the same time, White cop is breaking into Nino's house to get something from his safe...at night.
Dim, dark night.
At the same time as the bright, sunshiny daytime.
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White cop can crack safes, too.
Later in the movie, he's going to show us how to cook a three-minute egg in two minutes. He's just that good.
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The wedding is nearly over, but the entire CMB inner circle is still there...because apparently they're cleaning things up.
Wait, the catering staff is all Italians.
Italians?!?!
Oh, there are two little girls still there. They're needed to have to run back across the screen before the shooting begins.
It worked in Untouchables...it worked in Battleship Potemkin...it'll work in New Jack City...
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Where did all the fifteen degree camera angles go? I kinda miss them.
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The Italians ?!?!?! are really bad shots.
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Ice T has his first moment of conflicted conscience - he has a clear shot at Nino while the shooting is going on and decides to pass.
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Suddenly Nino's girlfriend (not the one who came between the 'brothers', she's apparently mysteriously gone) says Nino is a murderer...that she's seen him kill too many people.
Um, have you not been watching the same movie as the rest of us?
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The CMB are back in the muted primary colors again. Apparently things are going well again.
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3:34 - three Italians playing cards at a street-side trattoria that isn't under a bridge.
Except in the next cut, it is.
At 3:38 I think Judd Nelson might be one of the Italians.
At 3:40 I think Paulie Walnuts might be one of the Italians.
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Driving a motorcyle in a hood with eyeholes that small must really cut down on your peripheral vision.
Plus the guy doesn't have a helmet.
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Worst drive-by shooting death scene ever. Check the guy in the orange shirt at 3:47.
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The final drug buy, sting scene is here. Nino Brown is "Mr Untouchable" as we just heard, but it's taken about fourteen movie minutes for him to trust Ice T enough to buy drugs directly from him in a warehouse.
That's about right.
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Oh, and the warehouse has an Asian cop leaning into the window with a camera and a big zoom lens.
Nobody notices that even though we're about to see that the warehouse has dozens of CMB henchmen throughout the rafters and catwalks.
Apparently Asians are invisible...must be magic.
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We flash on the upper class computer guy's face. He's remembering something.
Wow, it's a most un-opportune moment for that.
Apparently Washington (Ice T) is Five Oh, man.
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White cop drives his car through the warehouse door.
The car breaks though about three feet above ground.
Apparently the road outside is at the height of plot.
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Step one, White cop saves the briefcase full of money.
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And apparently White cop is wearing black face.
'Cause he's not racist.
Seriously, 6:50 in the above clip, you tell me Judd Nelson isn't wearing black face makeup.
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At 7:01 could they not afford to use the Wilhelm scream?
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Did you know that when a guy gets shot from above, he flies backwards - even if there aren't any signs of the bullets hitting him?
Oh, and he flies into empty cardboard boxes which break his fall.
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Nino hangs upside down to surprise a cop and slit his throat. Luckily the cop and Nino wear exactly the same size uniform.
Nino is now wearing his worst outfit of the movie.
Instead of running, though, he lies in wait and kills Asian cop without Asian cop making a sound.
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8:59 would also have worked for the Wilhelm scream.
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Seriously...look at 9:04 and tell me whether you think White cop is wearing black face makeup for the raid.
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I can't take this anymore. I'll be back next week to wrap up the last fifteen or so minutes of New Jack City complete with the final fall of Nino Brown, the show of restraint from Ice T, Wise Old Black Man's third and final appearance, and Nino Brown's soliloquy.
When last we left our intrepid blogger, he was 20:51 into blogging the entirety of New Jack City.
If you're following along at home, the current recap runs from 2:40 in the following clip. Please remember that all clips are very much . Consider yourself warned.
"Big, crazy, jarhead, motorcycle freak, reject cop just like you, Scotty. He's a wild man that no one else wanted."
"Yeah, that means I'm expendable."
Um, Katydid, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't there some sort of screenwriting koan about showing instead of telling?
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Pointless image #823 of NJC - white cop lays down on the bed and fires the conveniently-loaded handgun of black cop into the conveniently-placed target shooting paper. The seven shots make a smiley face with dramatic sunlight streaming through the holes into the smokey air.
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Oh, good, another outstanding example of ethnic stereotyping: the Italian gangster. Only this gangster is young and hip. I can tell because he's young and hip, wears a nice suit, has a long ponytail, and has one weird, diagonal strip shaved into the left eyebrow.
Why was that ever a fashion thing?
At least the gangster doesn't have an over-the-top Italian accent. I don't know why van Peebles suddenly decided that now was the time to show restraint.
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We flash to the angry, young Italian gangster going back to the bar filled with not-so-young Italian gangsters. Everyone has a gold chain and at least two gold rings - often found on pinkies - and wears a suit with shirt open a couple of buttons.
Oh, and they call the Cash Money crew the "Cash Money Monkeys" and refer to their drug connections as "spikaroos".
The elder mobster says "You know what I say: you lay down with Peruvian dogs, you get up with Spanish fleas. Soon, Nino will itch, and we'll be there to scratch the hell out of him."
I swear I could have written that line when I was in seventh grade, and Mrs. VanOsdol would have told me to stop being so cute with my words.
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White cop is on top of the building taking surveillance photos using a camera with a foot-long lens. Right next to him is Ice T doing the same but with a secret agent tiny camera.
Because he's trying to blend in next to white cop, apparently.
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Re-enter Chris Rock. He's limping because Ice T shot him a few years back. He's begging food from Nino who's handing out food to the poor, doing some of that "Robin Hood b---s---," according to Ice T.
This is another example of why I think this movie was originally pitched as a multi-season television show. Rock's character appear, and within two minutes, Ice T had grabbed him from the crack house and forced him into rehab. If we'd been given two or three episodes to care about the Rock character, this might have worked. Instead, we have to take a leap of faith and somehow assume that Ice T cares enough about Pookie (Rock's basehead character) to save him from the depth of the crack den.
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In one scene, Pookie is yelling at Ice T, screaming to get this cop off of him. In the next he's confessing his sins and begging for help to get off of the crack. In the next - all assumed to happen sequentially - he's yelling and cursing Ice T again.
Luckily Ice T has been able to change into his awesome Adidas jacket and gold chain before dragging Pookie off to rehab.
Because it's important to be stylish when you're dropping off a junkie.
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Next scene, Ice T is standing at a stormy window as Pookie shakes and shivers from withdrawl. Ice T starts to put a hand on his shoulder but pulls back.
Sorry, pulls back emotionally.
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Now Pookie's rahabbing in Ice T's apartment with the storm raging outside the windows. The lights are dramatically dimmed, and Pookie is shirtless, his six-pack abs covered in sweat.
Right, because crack fiends have lots of time and inclination to do ab crunches.
And because cops take crack fiends into their apartments all the time.
Ice T comes to stand behind Pookie, offering silent reassurance...while wearing his pajamas, some sort of African rob open to his waist.
I'm wondering is this rehab doesn't involve a little something more than just a twelve step program.
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In the rehab meetings, Pookie breaks down as recovering addicts tell stories of their life on crack.
In other words van Peebeles take a few minutes to let his characters proselytize to the camera again.
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Montage time again...rehab...crying...working out with Ice T...collapsing to the floor while attempting the first jumping jack...White cop working on surveillance equipment...running in the sunset - being helped by Ice T...now Pookie is in the rehab meeting saying he's clean while Ice T looks on proudly from outside the door...
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Back to the fifteen degree camera angle. Now we're in the streets. I can tell.
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Pookie recounts how people buy drugs in the Carter. Everyone in the scene is black except our drug buyer who looks like Kurt Cobain - red and black flannel, dirty t-shirt underneath, jeans, stringy longish blonde hair.
Why a white guy?
Is van Peebles saying that whites were somehow taking advantage of the black community? That blacks were gaining power over whites? The New Jack Swing would someday lead directly to grunge?
Damn Mario van Peebles and his subtlety!
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"After you [buy your drugs] you can take your goodies home or stay at the Enterprise."
"What the hell's the Enterprise?"
"...On the street when you're smoking crack, they say that you're beaming up to Scotty, man. You're going to another world. It's like crackhead's the final frontier. That's why they call that room the Enterprise."
I'll readily admit that I know nothing about this culture, but the appropriation of Star Trek references by black, early-90's, drug subculture seems somehow unlikely.
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Oh, wait, two more white characters: a mother and her eight- or nine-year old daughter.
Mom's 'beaming up to Scotty' while the girl looks on.
At least it's not all negative.
She, she's a mother spending quality time with her kid.
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"For the Love of Money" reappears at the drastically improved Spotlite night club's New Year's Party.
Three years later and Flava Flav is still working the dance floor.
In the back room, Wesley Snipes (Nino) is leading a toast to celebrate what their group has become. The cinematography is a little obvious with him wearing an all-red suit over a black shirt standing in the center of the shot while his various lieutenants wear vaguely the reverse - largely black over colored shirts. The eye is drawn to Nino.
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Nino speaks to velour track suit (now in a sharply tailored black suit over red shirt, Nino's mirror duplicate) about how this isn't about money. This is about taking care of each other.
"Nothing and no one will ever come between you and me...never."
This is just after Nino chants "Am I my brother's keeper?" to the group to the answer of "Yes, I am!"
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Oh, by the way, the girl who will eventually come between them shows up three minutes and thirteen seconds later.
I'm surprised that van Peebles waited that long.
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Young Italian gangster shows up at the New Years party with a gift from The Don.
It's a foot-tall statue of a black lawn jockey with a noose around his neck.
Um, perhaps a nice candle or a gift certificate to Applebees would have been more appreciated.
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Nino carries a butterfly knife.
I'm kind of sad that the heyday of the butterfly knife is over and that I never learned to open one with the correct flourish.
It may have something to do with the fact that I never owned one, but who cares - the opening of a butterfly knife just looks cool.
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Post-New Years party, back at Nino's mansion, the two couples - Nino and his girl, valour track suit and the come-between-us girl - are watching Scarface.
I've never seen Scarface, but even I know that once the gangsters start watching scarface, that everything is about to go to hell.
First you watch the Scarface, then you get the downfall.
I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I bought New Jack City on DVD, a moive that I remember fondly from when it came out back when I was in high school (1991).
I've watched the movie once since I bought it, and I can freely admit that it isn't a good film, but it certainly is an interesting film. So I'm going to take a little bit, rewatch it, and jot down a few thoughts. I'm not sure whether this will end up as a single blog entry or a few, but it'll certainly be rambling.
First up, the trailer...this is going to be the last embedded clip that isn't . Consider yourself warned.
And now to the movie, itself.
From the first strains of the soundtrack, you can tell that this is a film with a message. This isn't a standard urban gangster, throw-away film. We get a flyover of Manhattan, heading to a black man holding a white, three-piece-suit-wearing over the edge of a bridge, threatening to drop him. Throughout the course of the flyover, the soundtrack plays an early-90's rap over the the O'Jay's "For the Love of Money", one of the all-time great bass lines. Radio clips play over the music, informing us that there are too many poor in the country, that there are wealthy preying upon those less fortunate, that the poor are addicted to drugs.
If there was a better way to scream "heavy-handed, message movie coming" as a warning, Mario Van Peebles didn't know it at this point in his filmmaking career.
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And out of a limo steps Wesley Snipes, resplendent in a head-to-toe, royal blue suit with a gold medallion the size of a bread plate on his chain. Snipes tells the upside down business man that "money talks, bull---- runs the marathon, " letting us know that he's a hip cat, someone who knows the old cliches but turns them on their ear with his own style.
Down goes the white man into the river.
And back to the radio voiceover:
The number of addicted infants born in Manhattan-area hospitals has risen steadily over the past few years. Hospital officials say that the care required by these, the smallest victims of the cocaine epidemic, has severly impacted the available resources allocated for pediatric care.
And, just in case you missed that this movie was going to be heavy, we pan down a mural painted on a building. The mural is a simple, single biblical quote:
Don't be decieved
Neither fornicators - nor
Idolaters nor adulterers...
Nor abusers of themselves
With mankind nor
Thieves nor drunkards
Nor revelers nor
Extortioners
Shall inherit the
Kingdom of God
1 Corinthians 6:10
No foreshadowing there, no heavy-handed pushing of the message.
I have absolutely no proof of it but I'm thinking that all of the radio voiceover was recorded for the movie rather than actually recorded off of the radio. There's no way that Van Peebles (the director, in case I hadn't mentioned) found radio quotes this on point to his message.
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And b'dam...Ice T, the main man himself in all his pre-Law and Order glory, eventually headed to the small screen but here acting for only the third professional (IMDB-listed, anyway) gig - after Fame, Breakin', and Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo (and those had been seven and eight years before NJC). This is the hard man, himself, and the casting of a member of NWA had to be a risk for a Hollywood studio.
Respect, Mario, respect.
Plus, Ice is paired up against a very young Chris Rock. Impressive talent.
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The camera circles our two actors as they talk through a drug deal, continually tiled at about a ten degree angle, reminding us that this film is not only heavy but edgy, too. We focus on Ice T's black, knit rastafarian hat, his gold chains, his black Adidas Raiders track suit, the Adidas shelltoes, the gigantic gold rings, the back-to-Africa t-shirt. Hell, I'm half expecting a Run DMC video to break out at any time.
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The chase is on as Rock robs Ice T and the deal goes sour. Our camera switches to overhead, back to a close up, then into another edgy tilt-ten-left-then-rotate-to-ten-right angle as Ice T hurdles down the stairs after Rock and the movie's theme, "New Jack Hustler" by Ice T, himself, plays over the chase.
Suddenly the previously dry streets are wet, and Chris Rock is jumping a fence onto a playground where Ice T shoots him in the heel, bringing him down but spilling the drug deal money into the wind, bringing people from all over.
...
I swear that one person - when he runs over for the money - says "He's kicking his monkey a--".
I'm not making that quote up.
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Three times we flash back to a well-dressed, black man watching the shooting scene unfold. I wonder if he'll be an important character later on. Maybe if they'd flash back to his stunned face a couple more times, I might have an idea that he was somehow important.
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We're on a new basketball court with a dozen young black men. The lead is in a velour track suit with a four-inch dollar sign gold medallion. His leather Kangol hat is turned backwards, of course. The others all have bucket hats and Adidas non-velour track suits. His left hand has a dollar-sign ring spanning at least three of his fingers.
Seriously, did Run DMC have a hand in producing this film?
Velour-track-suit makes bets and shoots a twenty-footer for all the money. It took me five watchings, the final one slowed down to a crawl, to tell whether he made the shot or not. The rim doesn't have a new, so it's almost impossible to tell that he swished the shot. Sure, he acts like he made it and collects his winnings, but the actual shot might as well have been missed for the way it looks on screen.
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We spin right - again, camera tilted ten degrees - to see Wesley Snipes in a Jeep Wrangler, brick-sized cell phone to his ear, the business-man-dropping guy driving. Velour hops in the back, spanning at least fifty feet in the blink of an eye.
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Montage of the city storefronts...
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Wesley Snipes is different. His Kangol is turned sideways.
Take that, convention.
Take that, white man.
Take that, Charlie Murphy.
There's a new Darkness in town.
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And of course Flava Flav is in the movie with a giant clock necklace.
How could he not be?
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And the rap he's doing samples heavily from the Inspector Gadget theme.
Because it's the 90s.
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Wesley Snipes drinks Dom Perignon straight from the bottle...with a straw.
Because it's the 90s.
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We're twelve minutes into the film.
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Ah, our first chance for a direct soliloquy.
Snipes: Because you got to rob to get rich in the Reagen era.
They running a strange program, y'all. I mean mo' po' and disenfranchised folks than this place has ever seen. And see they try to put this s--- off and act like it don't exist. Velour: Meanwhile, the rich get richer...
Black businessman from earlier scene: ...and the poor don't get a f---ing thing.
Snipes: Times like these, people want to get high...real high and real fast, and this is gonna do it.
(focus in on vial of freebasing cocaine, crack)
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I think this movie was originally written as a television series proposal.
After Snipes gives his preachings, he lays out the plan: take over The Carter (an apartment building) and turn it into a drug, making, distributing, using Mecca. This plotline eventually wraps up in about thirty or forty minutes, and the movie switches to a different storyline with the same characters, the kind of thing that would have happened with a one-hour, television drama.
Sure the language would have to have been cleaned up drastically (NJC is all about the ). Maybe this plotline would actually have worked better as the first season story arc. In the movie the takeover of the Carter is about to take like five minutes via montage, but the consolidation of the Carter would be a number of episodes and have a lot more drama involved.
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Velour is now wearing a tailored suit and killing people in broad daylight on the sidewalk.
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We get our first visit from the wise old black man who appears at various times throughout the film to decry the actions of Wesley Snipes's Nino Brown character. Here he only looks on disapprovingly as Snipes holds a shotgun to the head of a naked man who is being divested of his control of the Carter's operations.
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Time for the 'consolidating power montage' with a capella, doo wop "For the Love of Money" being sung by a quintet of black kids on the street corner. The lyrics "don't let money change it" and "all mighty dollar" are emphasized this time.
I'm thinking that "For the Love of Money" could have worked really well as a recurring leitmotif in the NJC television series, sort of the way "Way Down in the Hole" was for The Wire.
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The gang - Snipes and Velour's gang - is now wearing custom-made clothes. They're sort of a letterman's jacket with leather sleeves and knit main in all black with red, glitter CMB on the back and on the front lapel.
Nothing says 'serious movie' like henchmen dressed alike.
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Is Wesley Snipes really The Joker?
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Oh, and some of them have CMB shaved into their afros, too.
Because it's the 90s.
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Snipes is now wearing a white suit with black t-shirt underneath.
I'm thinking I couldn't pull that off without looking like a moronic Sonny Crockett.
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And it's winter by the time the montage ends, and there are only three singers in the group. Apparently it's the group Levert, which makes sense because I would have sworn it was one of the O'Jays standing around the burning trash can at the end of the montage. (According to this, one of the O'Jays was a father to two members of Levert.)
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It's 1989 now. I know because the screen said 1989 at the bottom. No reason for subtlety at this point.
I think the movie said 1986 at the beginning.
Ice T is leaning against a chain link fence outside a playground (probably not the same one as earlier, but maybe), and we zoom in to see a kid pick up a cheap soccer ball from a puddle. The puddle is filled with disposable vials, the same kind that we just saw the CMB (Cash Money Brotherhood) filling with crack in the Carter during the montage.
Seriously, subtlety has no place in this movie.
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Wise black man is back, and we're on to season two of the series.
He's yelling at a clearly out-of-touch policeman saying that "[He] wants to know how drug pushers could take over an entire apartment building right under your noses."
Wise black man isn't really part of the story at this point. He's just window dressing so Mario Van Peebles (director and now actor, back since Sweet, Sweetback's Bada----- Song) can push past him as the harried police detective who 'gets it' and is willing to fight the drug pushers the right way, the only way they know how. Thankfully Detective Gets It has an Asian assistant detective who can help him out.
Detective Gets It puts down photos of his two choices for officers who will work on his soon-to-be-successful task force: Ice T and Judd Nelson.
Seriously...Judd Nelson.
"These two are trouble," says the Police Commissioner. He might as well have yelled that they're both "loose cannons."
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Soliloquy #2
Police Commissioner: You and I both know the system wasn't ready for this kind of epidemic. Crack came on the scene and spread like wildfire.
But now I got the Mayor...and the governor on my back. I need some results...Fast!
You get me Nino Brown (Wesley Snipes). Forget Paretti (Nelson) and Appleton (Ice T), the risk's too high.
Van Peebles: With all due respect sir, I mean you still don't get it. You're talking about a war out there that we're losing, and you're not gonna give me what I need to win.
Now I need some cops who know these streets. I need some New Jack cops to take down a New Jack gangster.
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A motorcycle pulls up. The kickstand kicks down. The jeans are rolled up but not pegged. The hobnail boots are worn heavily at the toe. The laces aren't tied.
Hell, it's John Frickin' Bender.
I swear that Judd Nelson walked into this movie wearing the same boots that he last had on as John Bender in The Breakfast Club. Are we supposed to believe that Nick Paretti is some kind of grown-up John Bender?
We'll see in our next installment of Pardon our ramblings: New Jack City...
. You have been warned.
