Tag: hip hop

MFKZ (international title: Mutafukaz)

Posted on by mjbstaging

Firstly, Mutafukaz (as MFKZ was originally named) is a Japanese animated feature made by the French for the French market utilising Japanese animation expertise (the version playing at the London Film Festival is French with subtitles, though the end credits suggest there might also be an English language version), secondly a very French, lowlife, dystopian action movie to rank alongside the live action likes of Nikita (Luc Besson, 1990) and, particularly, District 13 (Pierre Morel, 2004) and thirdly an adaptation of a French bande dessinée, the director Guillaume Renard having penned the original in comic book form under the name Run.

The animation medium allows the piece to completely design its images and environment from, as it were, the blank page/empty screen upwards and the results are fabulous. Japanimation company Studio 4°C previously worked on such high profile anime productions as SF portmanteau Memories (Katsuhiro Otomo, 1995), avant garde pop video Noiseman Sound Insect (Koji Morimoto, 1997) and fan favourite Spriggan (Hirotsugu Kawasaki, 1998) to name but three (others are name dropped in the trailer) and pull out all the stops here.

(Ange)lino is a small, young, black guy vaguely resembling Marvin Martian without the helmet and struggling to survive the mean streets of Dark Meat City (“DMC, as in Desperate, Miserable, Crap”) where he rents a roach-infested apartment with his mate Vinz whose head resembles a human skull, bare bone, no flesh, column of fire permanently burning on top. Lino can barely hold down a job for more than a few days.

We first meet Lino on a pizza delivery boy gig which falls apart when the sight of a pretty girl causes him to have a bike accident. Unemployed, Lino and Vinz are visited by their nervous liability of a friend Willy. As the three cruise around in a car, Lino notices a strange phenomenon inspired by They Live (John Carpenter, 1988): people who cast shadows belonging to creatures not of this Earth. Meanwhile, a mother with her baby in her arms is being hunted by mysterious, gun-toting men in black suits led by one wearing a white suit. Before long, they’ll be after Lino and Vinz too.

The film rattles along at a rapid pace through urban malaise, gangland shoot-outs and conspiracy theories, in passing presenting a squalid environment that could stand in for the seamier side of any number of real life cities. Designed in glorious, eye-popping colour and with a hip hop sensibility referencing Grand Theft Auto and more, it never lets up for a moment.

Although the production values have anime written all over them, with key fight scenes shots sporting familiar tropes of that medium, Renard’s Francophile sensibilities inject a whole other aesthetic and indeed feel to the proceedings. It’ll no doubt be huge in France, but it’s an impressive work which transcends its national culture and deserves to see a UK distributor taking a chance and giving it a proper release here too. I could never imagine London Transport accepting posters bearing the film’s international title, though. Which is why the new English language title MFKZ makes a lot of sense.

MFKZ played at BFI London Film Festival 2017 as Mutafukaz. It’s released in the UK on October 11th. Watch the 2017 international film trailer and the new 2018 English language film trailer below:

Patti Cake$

Posted on by victorfraga

Hip hop culture has become mainstream. Consider the amount of money hip hop artists earn now: Jay-Z signed a 10-year exclusive contract with Live Nation. But real hip hop lovers never forgot that hip hop emerged out of the poor living conditions in America’s inner cities, such as the Bronx. In the 1970s, the construction of the Cross Bronx Expressway divided the Bronx communities, relegating Caribbean immigrants to a life of ostracism. Patti Cake$ investigates what hip hop turned into. It’s time for a reinvention.

Newcomer Danielle MacDonald stars as aspiring rapper Patricia Dombrowski, a.k.a. Killa P., a.k.a. Patti Cake$. She is just 23 and she hasn’t done anything remarkable yet. She is surrounded by people who the system rejected – disabled, drunkards, the poor and the old. If Patti doesn’t wake up, she will end up stuck in a miserable rut. Her story is not too different from Queen Latifah’s.

Her naivité is evident. She hopes that a producer just like Jay-Z will rescue her from oblivion. In the film, he is an arrogant musician and producer who forgot his roots. She has a crush on another hip hop singer, which whom she once had a fling, but now sees her a human version of Dumbo, the elephant. They end up fighting in a new impromptu hip hop song, in the middle of the streets.

Patti Cake$ in the first feature film from music video director Geremy Jasper. Set in gritty strip-mall suburbia, Patti Cake$ chronicles a quest for fame and glory with humour, raw energy and inventive beats. The soundtrack is not exclusively hip hop. Patti spits her life drama in Mylifesfuckinawesome. She then allows other artists tell her story: Bruce Springsteen, Patti Smith, Skid Row, Run DMC and the Fugees. Jasper reintroduces the essence of hip hop to the mainstream rappers.

The film is full of memorable quotes. Check IMDB trivia in a few months from now. Rappers are sharp-tongued. Good scriptwriters, too.

Funny films are one of the great sources of creativity in cinema industry. But comedy doesn’t survive without an amazing cast. Patti’s grandmother is played by Cathy Moriarty, who was born in the Bronx, to Irish immigrants. Her background could have given her the status of a rapper. That didn’t happen. Instead, at the age of just 17, Moriarty became famous for her role as Vicki LaMotta in Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980).

In a nutshell, there are three very good reasons to watch Patti Cake$: the soundtrack, the reinvention of hip hop and the humour. It is out in cinemas across the UK on September 1st.