Menace II Society

Watts, Los Angeles. Caine Lawson has just finished high school, sells drugs and lives inside crime with his friend O-Dog. There is one way out: going to Atlanta with Ronnie. His past, his choices and the people around him will not allow it. The Hughes brothers directed, both twenty at the time. They had previously made the video for Tupac Shakur's Brenda's Got a Baby. Tyrin Turner plays Caine and Larenz Tate plays O-Dog, with Jada Pinkett in her first theatrical film and Samuel L. Jackson and Charles S. Dutton in the cast. Tupac Shakur was originally cast as Sharif and was fired early in the shoot. According to MC Eiht, Shakur objected that the script did not explain why his character had converted to Islam. Allen Hughes later said that if Pac had been in the movie he would have outshined everyone. On a 3.5 million dollar budget it took 30 million, opening with 3.8 million. Rotten Tomatoes sits at 85 percent. Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel both put it on their best-of-1993 lists. It won Best Movie at the 1994 MTV Movie Awards, beating Jurassic Park and Schindler's List. Who it is for: viewers who like nineties Black cinema and neighbourhood stories. Who it is not for: anyone who cannot take the level of violence. From the opening scene the film softens nothing.