Pop Culture In The Movie Boyz N The Hood

The film Boyz N the Hood is a story about life in South Central Los Angeles. The film was wrote and directed by John Singleton in 1991. I chose this movie because of its relevance to the course and how it reflects pop culture in that time period. The opening line in the movie “one out of every twenty-one Black American males will be murdered in their lifetime” really catches the audience attention (Nicolaides & Singleton, 1991). This movie goes into detail and shows the life of three young males living in the hood of Los Angeles battling a life surrounded by drugs, violence, and questions of race.

The Murder Trial of Biggie Smalls Rathbone, William Unit 7 Assignment CJ 101 Wallace Biggie was one of the most powerful rappers before getting murdered in drive by shooting in March of 1997. At time he was killed the police had many theories of why he got murdered on that day. The police had multiple suspects about who did it but wasn’t sure of who or why they murdered Biggie Smalls. On that day Biggie was on his way to the hotel from the music party. When his SUV came up to the stop light, he could hear someone call his name, so he rolled his back window down to see who that’s when he was shot multiple times in the torso and then the suspects drove away from the murder.

Fruitvale station is movie that tackles the stereotypes of racism, police- brutality and poverty all in the matter of 85 minutes. Based on a true story, the movie follows its protagonist Oscar Grant III in his final hours leading up to his death. Grant was brutally shot by police officers in Hayward California on New Year’s Day 2009. Fruitvale station depict his everyday life and centers around him and his family and the effects situations such as poverty, racism and police brutality can have on certain demographics. It also shows that sometimes all three are intertwined.

In the movie “Friday” it displays a typical day in the ghetto and what obstacles two young black men had to go through just to get through one day. Ice Cube a famous American rapper from LA’s popular 90’s hip hop group NWA wrote this historic black comedic/drama film and along plays the main character Craig Jones. Craig plays the neighborhood hero after a chaotic day where he deals with bullies, his love life, annoying neighbors, and scary drug dealers. The film is based in south central LA in the mid 90’s where Craig and his best friend Smokey who is played by comedian/actor Chris Tucker find themselves in trouble after thinking it would be a typical Friday in the ghetto. Craig a young black man in his early twenties lives at home with his parents is determined to leave the ghetto but there 's just some things holding him back.

Derek is an extremely clever and charismatic student, but he has been influenced by his father 's racism. After an African-American drug dealer kills his father, Derek is drawn into a white supremacist neo-Nazi group. He was lured and used by Cameron, the actual controller, and Cameron makes Derek a symbol and hero of the group. There he commits several criminal acts and eventually serves three years for killing two black men for carjacking. Derek goes through some incidents in prison including being victimized by a white-supremacist group and befriending a black coworker.

Dwayne Johnson played as John Matthews, an heroic father in the film. For example, he went through hell and back to reduce his son’s ten year sentence because he comes up with a plan to free himself and Daniel from both government and the cartel. During the run, he is able to escape Cooper 's surveillance. At the same time, Daniel goes to Malik 's house, killing his guards and mortally wounding him. Before dying, Malik reveals Pintera’s cell phone number to Daniel.

(Wahl, 1999) As new black artists began creating music leading into the 80s, historical events were beginning to allow artists to use music as a platform to discuss social and political injustice in ways that had never been seen before. One specific gangster rap group, N.W.A (Niggaz Wit Attitudes), used this so-called platform to shed light on the injustices of a black man living in the city of Compton in the most raw and purest way possible. (Wahl, 1999) During the late 1980s, Compton was often seen as a city of violence and even got the label of the most dangerous city in America throughout the nation.

When he visited the gay bars often had to offer the boys or men money to lure them to his apartment (Schwartz,1992). As stated in Ewing (2006), in November, Dahmer committed his second murder, but Dahmer never recalled how the man died, just that carried the body in a suitcase to his grandmother’s house. At the house he told authorities he masturbated on the body, skinned and dismembered it and threw the remains of the body in the trash. Dahmer’s killing spree would rapidly escalated nearly two months after the second homicide and would last for about three and half years before the police would finally catch him (Ewing,2006). According to Schwartz (1992), later in Dahmer’s confession he said, “he killed his victims to prevent them from leaving”.

The block parties, graffiti art, rapping, disc jockeying and diverse forms of dancing built Hip Hop by the black youth. They expressed their feelings, thoughts, but most importantly the problems they had to face, which were related to their race, gender and social positions. The rights that were given to black people during and after the Civil Rights Movement left the following generations at a lack of how to continue the fight for black rights. Hip Hop gave them this platform and with the usage of black nationalism, Hip Hop can explore the challenges that confront American-Americans in the post-Civil Rights Movement era. In the 1990’s Hip Hop lived its prime, sub genres started to appear and famous groups, MCs led the whole community, providing a voice to a group of people trying to deliver their message.

The drama begins with the actor (Odarion also known as OD) giving an insight about his tragic death, preparing the audience for the devastation that lie ahead. It seems to be that gang relations are the only forms of social connectivity that we engage in. As a result, youth are the “hot topic”in headlines of the local newspaper – “ Nineteen Year Old Male Gun Down!”. No longer are we able to settle disputes as civilized individuals, but rather resort to violence. Violence and social decay have become realities on our Bahama island, where chaos and greed have consumed a generations people who have little hope left.

He came unannounced and made his way into the mayor’s office where he used a revolver to kill his former colleagues (Eyerman,2012). Harvey Milk will always be remembered for his social movement with gay rights. He was an important figure during his short lifetime and today. His legacy continues on through activism and memorial sites both in San Francisco City Hall and Harvey Milk Plaza.

An example of this racism and stereotyping in TV shows made as humor is the ever long lasting show, The Simpsons. A long running joke on this show is the use Hindus only working in grocery stores and giving their owners very stereotypical name for being Hindu. These subtle but racist on going joking, but the public think it is okay to have these racist mindsets. Using stereotypes are also happens frequently in movies.

John Singleton is a phenomenal film director who is also known for the critically acclaimed movie Boyz N the Hood; I was surprised to find that this outstanding director is also from the same background as the characters in his films; he grew up in South Central Los Angeles. How he got introduced to the film is that in his teens every day he volunteered as a Gofer for USC film school, eventually, they allow him to attend as a student, there he studied to be a director. So he watches and experience and grew up around the areas of South Central Los Angeles, enough to reflect the same images in his films exactly how it is in South Central Los Angeles. Another significant film Singleton directed was a film called “Baby Boy” which tells about a

After watching the movie “A Class Apart: A Mexican American Civil Rights Story”, I realized that I didn’t know much about how Mexico lost part of their land to the United States and about how hard life used to be for Mexican Americans compared to now. I learned about how Mexican Americans were treated in the United States. The movie was mainly about how Mexican Americans were discriminated and they were treated as inferior people. They were not seen as actual “Americans”, but as a second class, calling them names like “shiftless, lazy, dumb, etc.” Another important thing I learned is who was Gus García and what he did for Mexican Americans.

Agenda Setting describes the ability the media has on an audience when influencing them on selective topics. For example, if the news cover a topic frequently and prominently, the audience will note this particular issue as important. The mass media is a diverse concept of unique information. The first time I heard the term “Slippery-Slope” was in the film Dope.