Dustin: 3.5 of 5 stars Nick: 3.5 of 5 stars Average: 3.5 of 5 stars (Live canary)
Dustin: Dope is a comedy about a black kid and his two best friends who are accused of trying to be white for getting good grades and aspiring to go to college. Shameik Moore stars as Malcolm, a boy living in a part of town known as “The Bottoms” with his single mother and one memory of his father from Nigeria. He is trying to get into Harvard, but doesn’t know how to stand out to the admissions committee. Through a string of misadventures, he ends up with a bag of a cocaine-like drug known as “Molly” and relies on the help of his two best friends to get rid of it.
Nick: The film has a very recognizable storyline while being shot in an original and fresh style, like Birdman, but not to that extent. All the expected things happen, but as the scenes played on the film continued to succeed in its wholly predictable story. Although the story is predictable, it’s also over-complicated for the time allotted. Dope should either have been less complicated and shortened or kept the complicated story, but added to it to where the characters can have the right amount of depth and elongated the running time.
Dustin: I liked the motley crew of characters. Malcolm and his two best friends, Jig and Diggy, are unlikely protagonists. Malcolm is an awkward, geeky black kid who sports a ‘90s-style flattop hairdo. Jig is his “14 percent black” Mexican friend, and Diggy is a lesbian often mistaken for a boy. They are obsessed with their idea of ‘90s pop culture and have a punk band with upbeat tunes that often play on the soundtrack. A lot of the secondary characters, though, feel a little more like types. There’s the Blood who is willing to kill Malcolm for his bag of dope, and the bystander witness who makes a spectacle of himself on the nightly news. But the originality and likeability of the main characters was like a breath of fresh air.
Nick: A$AP ROCKY was solid as Dom as well. An amusing thing I found out after the film was that the filmmaker, Rick Famuyiwa made my favorite “black” movie ever, The Wood. During Dope I kept thinking that the kids and the situations they get into reminded me of the flashback scenes in The Wood. Another film Dope reminds me of is Dear White People. They are not the same movie whatsoever, but they both have the geeky black teen who can’t get along with any other black kid and the ending message, which Dear White People actually deserved since it actually covered what the film was about. The last scene in Dope felt so out-of-place with its preachiness and self-congratulatory comments. The film doesn’t reach the depths that the last few comments made by Malcolm seem to think. Dear White People gets a lot closer to deserving it’s final statement.
Dustin: I liked the motley crew of characters. Malcolm and his two best friends, Jig and Diggy, are unlikely protagonists. Malcolm is an awkward, geeky black kid who sports a ‘90s-style flattop hairdo. Jig is his “14 percent black” Mexican friend, and Diggy is a lesbian often mistaken for a boy. They are obsessed with their idea of ‘90s pop culture and have a punk band with upbeat tunes that often play on the soundtrack. A lot of the secondary characters, though, feel a little more like types. There’s the Blood who is willing to kill Malcolm for his bag of dope, and the bystander witness who makes a spectacle of himself on the nightly news. But the originality and likeability of the main characters was like a breath of fresh air.
Nick: A$AP ROCKY was solid as Dom as well. An amusing thing I found out after the film was that the filmmaker, Rick Famuyiwa made my favorite “black” movie ever, The Wood. During Dope I kept thinking that the kids and the situations they get into reminded me of the flashback scenes in The Wood. Another film Dope reminds me of is Dear White People. They are not the same movie whatsoever, but they both have the geeky black teen who can’t get along with any other black kid and the ending message, which Dear White People actually deserved since it actually covered what the film was about. The last scene in Dope felt so out-of-place with its preachiness and self-congratulatory comments. The film doesn’t reach the depths that the last few comments made by Malcolm seem to think. Dear White People gets a lot closer to deserving it’s final statement.
Dustin: I agree with that sentiment. I don’t really get why the movie decided to climb onto the soapbox for the final few minutes. I think the movie got its point across without doing that, and the ending sort of diminished what came before, as that is what will be hanging in people’s minds as they walk out the theater.
There was another scene that also hit the wrong note entirely. This was when they were talking about how dangerous life is in the hood. A black kid gets shot while standing in line playing a Game Boy at a fast food restaurant. He’s in the wrong place at the wrong time. They show a blood-splattered Game Boy hit the floor, and during this tragic moment, they inserted a joke, and ran with it into the next shot. I didn’t feel like laughing, and even in a dark comedy, showing an innocent child get murdered isn’t funny.
Nick: I actually did laugh for a short moment but only because it was the original Game Boy and all my amazing and awful memories of that handheld device came flooding back. Dope sets up so many story lines that hardly ever get more than a mention. Malcolm is going to help his “dream-girl” study for her G.E.D. This is shown once and then at the very end she has passed. The main bad guy of the film, who is a rich and powerful type, has a daughter who becomes a viral video sensation for something illegal, is never shown getting flack for this even though he is publicly a good man who went to Harvard. Then, of course, is the Blood who you think is going to be the bad guy, but is then written off quickly and that storyline is completely gone. There are many small stories throughout the movie that makes it seem Dope would have worked better as a mini-series on HBO, where it could have seen out these storylines in a smoother fashion before adding more storylines that never get fulfilled.
Dustin: The movie definitely has an abundance of loose-ends, like you mentioned. In the hyperactive scene you just alluded to, the rich guy’s daughter ODs on “Molly” and ends up running across a busy street to pee in some bushes. Malcolm, who was in the car with her, is late for his Harvard alum interview, and basically steals her car and abandons her. Her brother, who was meanwhile getting shot in the leg, is in a high-speed police pursuit and sees Malcolm as he passes him. Yet, we never learn the consequences or outcome of any of this. We never learn what happens to Dom in jail, and apparently no one ever asks Malcolm for the $100,000 some dollars he made selling the dope, or for the dope itself. He lives in an environment where people are killed for no reason, but himself is immune to consequences and even ends up at Harvard.
Nick: Don’t forget that Malcolm’s physique is one of an athletic teen instead of one whose only exercise is biking around between school and home. It’s also shocking he doesn’t have a job. He wants to get into Harvard, yet he doesn’t have a job and his mom works as a bus driver. So his only hope is to get a full-ride from Harvard or be in some major debt in the future if he actually gets accepted. You would also assume he would have many extra curriculars and or doing charity in order to put it on his application. He seems like an entitled kid who just wants things to be given to him instead of working toward the goal he desires. Which actually does fit the plot of the movie, but by the end with his preachiness on the soap box it ruins most of what he might have learned having to clean up a situation for himself.
Dustin: I didn’t really think of that, but now that you mention it, Malcolm’s life does seem at odds with the world of the movie. He does come off as a privileged kid. Band equipment isn’t cheap. He lives in a decent house rather than a low-income housing project. And he devotes a lot of time (and, presumably money) to following obscure interests--something that’s usually associated with the upper-middle class. Come to think of it, his teenage years were probably better than mine growing up in the whitebread suburbs.
Nick: One of the many things I enjoyed were the scenes with Blake Anderson (Workaholics). Mostly the ones where he tries to convince them that he should be allowed to say the N word in an affectionate way towards his friends like all of them do towards each other. The N word is mentioned in an almost countless capacity to the extent he might have a point, but of course in only in an affectionate manner!
Dustin: I enjoyed most of the movie and came to like the characters. There were some miscalculations and too many loose-ends, but overall, it was an entertaining and original film.
Nick: I actually did laugh for a short moment but only because it was the original Game Boy and all my amazing and awful memories of that handheld device came flooding back. Dope sets up so many story lines that hardly ever get more than a mention. Malcolm is going to help his “dream-girl” study for her G.E.D. This is shown once and then at the very end she has passed. The main bad guy of the film, who is a rich and powerful type, has a daughter who becomes a viral video sensation for something illegal, is never shown getting flack for this even though he is publicly a good man who went to Harvard. Then, of course, is the Blood who you think is going to be the bad guy, but is then written off quickly and that storyline is completely gone. There are many small stories throughout the movie that makes it seem Dope would have worked better as a mini-series on HBO, where it could have seen out these storylines in a smoother fashion before adding more storylines that never get fulfilled.
Dustin: The movie definitely has an abundance of loose-ends, like you mentioned. In the hyperactive scene you just alluded to, the rich guy’s daughter ODs on “Molly” and ends up running across a busy street to pee in some bushes. Malcolm, who was in the car with her, is late for his Harvard alum interview, and basically steals her car and abandons her. Her brother, who was meanwhile getting shot in the leg, is in a high-speed police pursuit and sees Malcolm as he passes him. Yet, we never learn the consequences or outcome of any of this. We never learn what happens to Dom in jail, and apparently no one ever asks Malcolm for the $100,000 some dollars he made selling the dope, or for the dope itself. He lives in an environment where people are killed for no reason, but himself is immune to consequences and even ends up at Harvard.
Nick: Don’t forget that Malcolm’s physique is one of an athletic teen instead of one whose only exercise is biking around between school and home. It’s also shocking he doesn’t have a job. He wants to get into Harvard, yet he doesn’t have a job and his mom works as a bus driver. So his only hope is to get a full-ride from Harvard or be in some major debt in the future if he actually gets accepted. You would also assume he would have many extra curriculars and or doing charity in order to put it on his application. He seems like an entitled kid who just wants things to be given to him instead of working toward the goal he desires. Which actually does fit the plot of the movie, but by the end with his preachiness on the soap box it ruins most of what he might have learned having to clean up a situation for himself.
Dustin: I didn’t really think of that, but now that you mention it, Malcolm’s life does seem at odds with the world of the movie. He does come off as a privileged kid. Band equipment isn’t cheap. He lives in a decent house rather than a low-income housing project. And he devotes a lot of time (and, presumably money) to following obscure interests--something that’s usually associated with the upper-middle class. Come to think of it, his teenage years were probably better than mine growing up in the whitebread suburbs.
Nick: One of the many things I enjoyed were the scenes with Blake Anderson (Workaholics). Mostly the ones where he tries to convince them that he should be allowed to say the N word in an affectionate way towards his friends like all of them do towards each other. The N word is mentioned in an almost countless capacity to the extent he might have a point, but of course in only in an affectionate manner!
Dustin: I enjoyed most of the movie and came to like the characters. There were some miscalculations and too many loose-ends, but overall, it was an entertaining and original film.
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