This Flick Flows!

Rating: 9/10 (28 August 2005)

I just saw this movie tonight, and now wonder why I didn't go see it sooner. Everything, but everything, about this movie was excellent.
Acting. Terrence Howard is just fantastic. So really are all the actors and actresses.
Characters. Rough bunch, to be sure, but all ... especially D Jay ... showed such deep humanity under very difficult circumstances that they were attractive, appealing, likable. I wanted to know what was going to happen to each and every one of them.
Story. The plot, combining rags to riches with ghetto life with rap emergence ... was not in the least original, which is fine by me when the story is told with such skill and color and flavor and verve. It's a helluva yarn.
The World. The world of the movie is one with which I am myself very unfamiliar. So I sure can't comment on Authenticity. But I can comment on Believability: and this movie has it and then some. A whole world was created and depicted and maintained with a strong, convincing presence that I found very, very deeply moving.
Theme. Yes, it has a message. Not all message movies are effective. This one is, at least it is for me. The message is We gotta have dreams, and pursue them as best we can, within the parameters of the world as it really is. I came away from the movie feeling a sense of Hope and Gratitude. What a gift. What a movie.
Combine a helluva story with great characterization with superb acting in a compellingly believable world with an uplifting theme ... and you have Hustle and Flow. What a wonderful movie.