Three featurettes allow all principal cast and crew to weigh in on the filmmaking process and final product. Topics include his awe for his actors, his numerous cinematic inspirations (including The Commitments), the nitty-gritty about the music in the film, and the best lovemaking music. On a third track, director Brewer chattily breaks down the meaning and means of his breakthrough film. Hustle & Flow gets a dandy special edition from Paramount, with an excellent, film-like transfer and pumpin' 5.1 and 2.0 sound mixes. The rest of Hustle & Flow, I'm afraid, is all hype.Īspect ratios: 1.85:1 Anamorphic Widescreen Brewer's centerpiece scene captures the excitement of putting a track together, with supporting players Anthony Anderson and the exceptional Taraji P. But if so, Brewer tries to have his cake and eat it too: Hustle & Flow practically plays like a hip-hop version of The Buddy Holly Story with its predictable thrill of victory and agony of defeat.
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Well, okay, but the question remains: should a pimp be rewarded with his dream? If a challenge to our expectations by way of moral equivocality is the big idea, then Hustle & Flow could be anti-heroic by nature or perhaps a movie with no hero at all. Qualls explains, "Every man has the right-to contribute a verse." Rapper from the hood Skinny Black (played by Ludacris), who represents a possible ticket to success for Djay, says, "Everybody got to have a dream." bluster by having all of the characters explain why we should care. There's something to be said for rooting for anyone who's trying to do something better than what he has been doing, and Brewer shows he's capable of his own brand of B.S. Terence Howard's work as Djay is sort of dazzling, but his character's unrelentingly selfish behavior makes audience identification an uphill battle. The pity and fear are here, but no one this low can take a tragic fall. Brewer plays Djay's pathetic naiveté for tragedy instead. This might make good-if not exactly fresh-material for a poker-faced comedy, but the laughs come elsewhere (provided at the expense of scrawny white mix-master DJ Qualls). The street flows that come out of Djay range from sideways-sexist tripe ("Whoop That Trick") to laughably un-ironic self-pity ("It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp".cry me a river, you bastard), but Djay doesn't come off as a savvy exaggerator trying to turn a trick with Lady Luck rather, he's a get-rich-quick hopeful who's listened to enough rap records to fake it (in Howard's hands, DJay's discovery of his artistic ego is touching and subtly amusing). But should we have sympathy for the devil? But he's also a dreamer, and when he hooks up with an old high-school buddy with recording experience, Djay bullies himself and everyone around him into helping him cut a demo. Writer-director Craig Brewer's supposed slice of pimp life Hustle & Flow-the toast of Sundance-tells the story of Djay, a low-class pimp with a few women (one of them pregnant) under his power.