Scenes from the underbelly of America

Rating: 7/10 (6 November 2013)

When pop stars make films, these are often based of fictionalised versions of themselves, and Eminem's effort, '8 Mile', is no exception. But there are some things that make this movie more intriguing than most in the genre: firstly, his life story, a white kid growing up in a poor, mostly black district of Detroit who became a major rap star, is genuinely interesting; secondly, the director, Curtis Hanson, is a cut above the typical director of such an effort. And the film delivers on most of this promise: Eminem actually acts quite well, and the decayed environment of urban Detroit is a grimly fascinating slice of America relatively rarely depicted in the movies. As for the rapping, even if you don't like this music in general (and it's aggressive, misogynistic tendencies are very much on display), the idea of tongue-tied street kids finding their voice in spontaneous performance makes for an entertaining narrative. The film is quite long, however, and a little shapeless - unlike Eminem's real life story, there's no fairytale ending. The film obviously needed a real rapper to make it work, but this is no empty star vehicle, but a grimy and unglamourous film about life on the underside of the U.S.A.