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Hustle & Flow 

Directed & Written by: Craig Brewer
Starring: Terrence Howard, Anthony Anderson, Taryn Manning, Taraji P. Henson, Paula Jai Parker, DJ Qualls, Elise Neal, Ludacris, Issac Hayes.
Country: USA

         


Two CDs

Reviewed by Hal Gray

Da Show Ain’t Got No Motherfuckin’ Flow an’ the Hustle Lost the Muscle in da Tussle wit’ da Ho. 

It was a tough call what to see this week. It was either psychopathic paraplegics (Murderball), penurious penguins (March of the Penguins), mammillary merriment (Wedding Crashers) or rapscallionic rap (Hustle & Flow.) Despite the allure of the two documentaries and the sleazy and brilliant marketing of Jane Seymour’s tits—didn’t she do a Playboy spread in the last century?—I gave the first three a pass. I don’t know why, since I don’t give a rap for rap despite having written a romantic comedy about a hip hop gal falling for a C&W singer. (No lie. It’s called Hip Clop and sits under a stack of other yellowing scripts.)

The story: A struggling pimp discovers his inner soul and/or seeks fame and fortune through rapping.

Terrance Howard plays D., a small-time Memphis pot-dealer and pimp who has a philosophical bent. The opening scene—a C/U with D. waxing about life and what you have to do to live it—is promising mainly because we wonder who the hell he’s talking to. It’s Nola (Taryn Manning), his only operational girl who listens to D.’s diatribe with a sullen emptiness. One expects she’d rather have a hamburger than homilies.

D. looks after a small household. There’s Nola; Lexus, his stripper girlfriend; their young child; and Shug, another working girl, pregnant and a financial liability for the moment. The responsibility is wearing D. down. Then by a stroke of good fortune D. meets up with an old high school friend, Key (Anthony Anderson), who’s a sound recorder with visions of producing in his head. It’s a short leap to getting D. in front of a scratchy microphone.

As far-fetched as it might seem—the x-rated language and the tough ghetto life, notwithstanding—a light tone ascends much like the old Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland picture Babes in Arms and its sequel back in the ‘30s. You know, ‘Hey, let’s put on a show,’ and starry-eyed ambitions become true. Even if it’s the ghetto, it’s an American ghetto, after all. Anything can, and will, happen. Still, in the first hour, some nice, rough edges keep us grounded in reality.

Unfortunately, the second half is flat out boring. Once we move into the recording studio, time moves to a standstill. We endure a workshop on the small-time annoyances of recording. It becomes a film of small moments, with more significance to the Director/Writer Craig Brewer than to any story that’s being told.

The penultimate scene where D. gets his chance to pitch his tape to big-time rapper Skinny Black (Ludacris), is awash with ennui. Not satisfied with establishing the shallow ‘who’s the coolest bitch around’ milieu that the hip hop world suffers from, Brewer drives it into the ground.

Terence Howard is very good as D. although his accent is a touch forced particularly when he’s rapping. But he’s got a sound grasp of the character. The only problem is, no matter how good Howard is to look at and listen to, D.’s not a very sympathetic character. He lives off the ‘avails’ and doesn’t do much. Nola even asks him ‘What is it you do, D.? What is it you do?’ And one might ask, as well, ‘what does D. have to rap about?'

Nola, in her quiet way, turns out to be the more interesting character. First of all, she’s white trash in a black world. In a stroke of brilliance, this fact is never mentioned or examined, leaving her mystery—and power—to our imagination. Taryn Manning does a great job of speaking with her silences. She’s in and out of so many cars doing god knows what to so many men with barely a word of complaint. Now she would have something interesting to say. And for that matter, so would Shug (Taraji P. Henson), who quietly loves D., and Lexus (Paula Jai Parker), who gets tossed out on the street with her kid.

When D. finally lays down a track about his troubles pimping, well, who cares? And that underlines the other problem with Hustle & Flow. Is D. in the pursuit of a deeper meaning to life, or fame and fortune? And when he finds the latter—yes, this is America, as mentioned before—does he deserve it? Nope.

I left the theatre looking at my watch and yawning, but thanking my lucky stars there were only two rap songs, although that term borders on the oxymoronic.  

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