Dope

Plot synopsis:
Malcolm is a high school senior obsessed with 1990's hip-hop culture, along with his friends Jib and Diggy, he's a geek who is continually pushed around school. They live in "The Bottoms" part of Inglewood, California, a suburb of Los Angeles. Malcolm's ultimate dream is to go to Harvard but in a meeting with his counselor Mr. Bailey, Bailey calls Malcolm's desire to attend Harvard an arrogant one, and says that his straight A's don't mean a thing. Bailey then reminds Malcolm about his Harvard interview with a man named Austin Jacoby.
A street drug dealer, Dom, stops Malcolm and tells him to go a building and invite a girl named Nakia to Dom's birthday party. Nakia says she'll go if Malcolm is there. Malcolm tells Jib and Diggy, who both think it would be a great idea if they went.
The three go to Dom's party. At the party, Dom and his crew are buying powdered Molly when two rival gang members kick in the door and start shooting Dom's crew members, causing panic in the club. Dom hides behind the bar where he finds Malcolm's backpack. Thinking fast, he runs to Malcolm and tells him to run and don't stop. Malcolm sees Nakia on the floor and he helps her up.
Nakia drives Malcolm home, thanking him for helping her. She likes him for not being like Dom and the other guys she's used to dealing with. He asks Nakia to prom since she says she missed hers and he offers to help her study for her GED. Nakia says she'll think about it. The next morning at school, Malcolm walks through the metal detector, which goes off and the guard dog barks at Malcolm. Since the guard knows Malcolm, he lets him walk away assuming the metal detector is malfunctioning. Malcolm looks in his backpack and finds the "Molly" (MDMA street name) and a gun. Panicked, he runs into the band room with Jib and Diggy. He realizes Dom slipped all of this in his bag during the shootout. Someone then calls Malcolm's phone and demands that he bring the contents of the bag to him later in the day.
Malcolm walks over to a red El Camino as instructed, until he gets a phone call from Dom as he's being held at the station. He tells Malcolm that he was setup and needs to get out of there immediately since the guys could kill him. He orders Malcolm to go to an address that he'll text him and to ask for "AJ".
The three go to the address. They meet Jaleel and his half-naked sister Lily. AJ is their father, and won't be home until later and invites the three inside to hang out. Jaleel then takes Jib and Diggy out to get food while Malcolm stays with Lily. She ends up seducing him and offers to take his virginity. Malcolm catches Lily taking some of the molly from his backpack. She straddles Malcolm and vomits on his face. Malcolm then gets a phone call reminding him of his alumni interview. Lily offers to drive him there.
Lily, still high, drives recklessly through the streets until she passes out at a stop sign. The cops race past them, worried Malcolm tries to wake her up. She springs up yelling that she has to pee. Lily sprints across the road and squats to pee in a bush in front of a coffee shop, with other people watching and taping her. Malcolm takes her car and heads to the meeting himself.
Malcolm makes his meeting with Austin Jacoby. He realizes Jacoby is AJ after seeing pictures of Dom, Lily, and Jaleel in his office. He mentions having something for the man as instructed by Dom, but Jacoby doesn't want the drugs after this botched delivery. Jacoby implicitly tells him that with Dom in jail, there is no method of selling the drugs, but he needs them sold anyway. He then implicitly says that he will get Malcolm to Harvard if he can sell the drugs. He then reschedules the interview to give Malcolm time. With no other options, Malcolm, Jib, and Diggy decide to seek help from a stoner/hacker they met at band camp years ago named Will Sherwood. Will helps the three organize an online network through Bitcoin transactions that would allow them to sell the molly without getting it traced back to them.
The drug gets lots of attention after a video of Lily peeing in front of the coffee shop goes viral, so the drug itself is nicknamed "Lily".
Malcolm runs into Nakia, who still wants to study. He helps her, and she later opens up to him about dealing with guys like Dom. Malcolm thinks she was sent there by Dom to gather info on the drugs. Offended, Nakia leaves and says Malcolm is just like all the other guys. When trying to collect cash in exchange for the Bitcoin currency, Will tells Malcolm that they need to go "black market" for the money and need to meet with another gangster named Fidel X. Malcolm does so and then proceeds to give him a jump drive with the bitcoin information in exchange for the cash.
Malcolm returns to Jacoby's office and reveals that he secretly linked the bitcoin account to Jacoby's personal accounts. He brings ten percent of the money in cash, but tells Jacoby that he set up the account so that the DEA can trace the account if Jacoby ever tries to transfer the money electronically. Malcolm is the only way to get to the money, so Jacoby cannot kill him. Malcolm then demands that Jacoby get him into Harvard if he wants the money. Jacoby agrees to Malcolm's terms.
Malcolm goes home and starts to come up with a new college essay. He describes two students Student A is a geek that hangs out with his friends and gets straight A's, while Student B earns a lot of money in an unethical way. He asks, "Which student do you think I am?"
Malcolm and his friends go to prom together. He waits for Nakia, having apologized and given her a prom ticket. He goes home and finds her standing outside. She thanks Malcolm for helping her pass her GED. She then gives him a pass for Six Flags. She kisses Malcolm's cheek and walks back into her house.
Malcolm then goes home to find a big envelope from Harvard on his bed. He opens it and reads what's inside. He then looks to the audience for a moment before he smiles.

Tags: violence, murder, flashback

Review:
For the next one-hundred and ten minutes, the film works to illustrate all of those features in some way or another through a lens that's unique, refreshing, and respectful to its characters and their cultures.Our main character is Malcolm (Shameik Moore), a black teenager carefully surviving in his crime/drug-ridden neighborhood of Inglewood, California, Despite being influenced by modern forces like the internet and Bitcoin, he loves nineties hip-hop and the culture of yesteryear, and so do his two closest friends, Jib ("The Grand Budapest Hotel"'s Tony Revolori) and Diggy (Kiersey Clemons), who play in his punk band.
After being invited to a party thrown by a drug dealer (rapper A$AP Rocky), Malcolm works to craft a name for himself by getting invested in the online drug-drealing world, using the help of a local hacker and Bitcoin to create a huge influx of revenue for him and his friends.Famuyiwa attempts to do the same thing to African-Americans that John Hughes did with the middle class high school population in the 1980's, which is cut through the stereotypes, the incredulous romances, and what adults perceive teenagers to be like to really get to the heart of them as people.
The fact that it pays homage to the music and the urban movies of the 1990's is interesting because "Dope" doesn't focus on an anti-hero in a gritty neighborhood, much like the films of that era did.
Famuyiwa takes a brave step in the opposite direction of his peers, capturing acts like drug-dealing and backhanded deals in a light that accentuates joy and positivity, but it's all this that make "Dope" an even more fascinating character study, coming of age story, and a subversive tale about life in an urban area..
From there, he's taken on a crazy adventure littered with bad choice after bad choice, all the while juggling college applications and interviews that will surely determine his future.Writer/Director Rick Famuyiwa strips the film of any tired clichés or stereotypes for African-American characters, and surprisingly manages to infuse details that question the issues of racism and class discrimination.
Running at an overlong 1:45, you sense that money might have been the last thing on this writer/director's mind when he crafted the script; created some of the most endearing characters in modern film; carefully snuck into the dialog his puns, life lessons and bon mots; extracted top performances from his team; and ultimately created an experience that more "overwhelms" the viewer with images and ideas than "overpowers." I liked it.
By the very end, the viewer, while appreciative of the characters and the story, is pretty much lost.One hopes that in his next project Famuyiwa will pay more attention to the viewers and less to his own "bucket list" of things he wants to cram into the story.In that way, what starts as merely good ...
Short answer: all of them.The movie centers on highly intelligent black high school senior Malcolm (Shameik Moore) and his two friends, multi-racial Jib (Tony Revolori) and lesbian Diggy (Kiersey Clemons).
No matter what happens, the three friends seem destined to shed at least some of their labels, and maybe gain some new ones."Dope" reminds me of the inner-city-set films of the 90s (the very period with which the three main characters are obsessed), but with less violence and more laughs.
It also doesn't hurt that the movie is so well-written and well-directed by Rick Famuyiwa ("Brown Sugar", "The Wood") and has a strong, though little-known cast.Malcolm and his friends are appealing and sympathetic characters, but make some morally questionable decisions.
To sum up this review, let me suggest some slightly altered meanings for the film's title: Dope can refer to some of the movie's main characters, the curse of their neighborhoods or anyone who won't at least consider seeing the film because of labels they may have already assigned to it.
I was expecting some sort of run of the mill coming-of-age comedy after seeing the trailer, but the film is much more complex than that, incorporating lots of themes and ideas that make you think while also keeping up the fun entertainment the whole way through.
This movie has fantastic performances, an entertaining and fun plot that takes turns you never expect, and a great visual style that makes this stand out on its own in the Coming-Of-Age film genre.
Your main guy Shameik Moore did an incredible job at playing Malcolm, this teenager who is trying to keep in line with school and college whilst all of these problems come his way that force him to be someone more than just the geek.
While i was watching the film i wasn't so thrilled with the first 15 minutes or so, i felt that it was taking too long to introduce these characters and showing things that didn't look like they were leading anywhere.
For example, you can't make a story of a nerdy wimp who goes nose-deep into the criminal business, to the point when he's bound to ask himself whether he's still the "good guy" he used to position himself as, gets on top of the situation and comes back to the surface as nothing but the profitable stuff stuck to him.It could've worked if Dope was trying to be Burn-After-Reading-like hilarious, because crazy things do happen when you assume that people are ridiculous.
Congrats guys, that's really dope.The only thing this movie didn't manage to fit inside is that if you're a black man and you don't do sports, then going to Harvard is still possible even without having to deal with arms or drugs or even pop-punk bands and videoblogging.
Unlike many of the films that portray the 'hood' experience, Malcolm (Shameik Moore) is a leader of a geek trinity who is trying to survive in this world of gangsters and drugs dealers, while hoping to escape by applying to university, doing well on the SAT exam and successfully completing his entrance essay to Harvard.
Even though the ending does get a bit preachy and diminishes the message of the film, it does not devalue the innovative story telling.This odd, but appealing storyline provides characters and an authenticity to the portrayal of The Bottoms, but ultimately the lack of a moral centre fails the narrative.
Although not knowing exactly what it was going to be about from the previews, it seemed interesting, fun and sort of like another "The Wood" type of movie (awesome movie by the way and I LOVED the Stacey reference, that was cool)It started great and for the first 15-20 mins I was into it, but then it just started getting weird and complex.
Either way, check out Dope.+Moore's breakthrough role+Music+Original idea turns out to be so fun+Nerds seem like actual nerds-Second half takes a big dip in quality7.9/10.
DopeIn the 1990s, all you had to do to get the latest fashion trends was shoot the person wearing the clothes you wanted.Unfortunately, as this dramedy confirms, nowadays you have to actually purchase your Air Jordans.When a local pusher (A$AP Rocky) asks him for a favor, '90s rap aficionado Malcolm (Shameik Moore) and his friends (Tony Revolori, Kiersey Clemons) find themselves sitting on a backpack of MDMA belonging to a Harvard alumnus (Roger Guenveur Smith).Although Malcolm agrees to sell the powdered Molly for the cultured kingpin, in exchange, he wants to be accepted into the Ivy League university.A satirical commentary on the limited career choices for African American males, Dope is a smart and stylish coming-of-age anecdote with notable cameos, an imposing soundtrack, and a charismatic young lead, that never feels preachy or accusatory.Incidentally, you only have to sell inhalants to get accepted into Yale.
DOPE review by Mike SmithLife changes for Malcolm, a geek who's surviving life in a tough neighborhood, after a chance invitation to an underground party leads him and his friends into a Los Angeles adventure.This movie stuck with me for days.
Oh, and the soundtrack is one of the best I've heard in a film this year.As much as there is to like about Dope, it's not a great movie.
Towards the end, the social commentary which I actually didn't mind for the most part starts to get preachy and heavy handed which felt out of place as well.Even though Dope doesn't quite live up to the Sundance praise it received, it's still a very good film and one of the most enjoyable I've seen this summer.
The romantic subplot between Malcolm and Dom's girl was underdeveloped (which was a shame as they clearly had a few things in common).I also felt that Dope was a film that just tried far too hard and seemed to sledgehammer its point home at almost every given opportunity; I think the worst example of this was when the girl kept hitting the white guy for using the N word - I mean I understand the message that Famuyiwa was trying to get across, but he completely overdoes things here and it made me cringe due to the heavy-handed and clumsy way that Famuyiwa played out this scenario.Dope is also chocked full of hipster dialogue but in an unfocused film with no solid narrative structure a lot of it just comes across as trite and boring.
There is a twist to the story at the end which was quite amusing, but most of this film just fell flat for me.The only positive thing that I've got to say about this film is that the acting was generally good (particularly between the 3 leads), but I'm struggling to think of anything else that I liked about it in all honesty..
A solid example lies in this fresh coming-of-age drama directed and written by Rick Famuyiwa, starring Shameik Moore as Malcolm Adebanki, a high school senior growing up the Inglewood, a crime-ridden Californian neighborhood where drug dealing runs on nearly every street and gang violence is virtually an everyday thing.
Malcolm is young man with dreams of attending Harvard, makes outstanding grades, and carries a strong interest in 90s hip-hop culture, so much to where he plays starts a hip-hop band with his two best friends: lesbian tomboy Diggy (played by Kiersey Clemons) and Jib (played by Tony Revolori).
When he unexpectedly gets caught between a drug deal by a local drug dealer Dom (played by hip-hop artist A$AP Rocky) who hides the supply in his backpack during a shooting at a party, him and his friends find themselves on the off-the-rails adventure to leads them to discovering their true selves.While this movie certainly doesn't level up to other coming-of-age dramas like 'Perks of Being a Wallflower' or 'Stand By Me', it really hits home with portraying the dilemmas of growing up.
The best example is the character Dom talking about politics before the party takes a different turn.Dope is a surprising movie with a very fresh feeling.
The premise and the story-line are good but a bit simple but I do like the message the films gives about making the right choices in life.
And at the last he makes us think.I say it's a must watch for everyone who love something different and it was not boring though,was fun and interesting every scene had something to it...Movie is Dope, and it's true about all these drug stuff.
He shapes his character three dimensionally and adds a lot of layers to him, and that is vital since we are always sticking with him and rooting for him to succeed in every obstacle despite the fact that the choices he makes are morally ambiguous, we don't really care because his character and his friends, appropriately who we also root for thanks to even more good work from the actors, come first.The movie is also filled with an energy and a style that really deserve to be called out.
Stylishly directed, fabulously scripted, cleverly witted & riding high on a stellar performance from Shameik Moore, Dope is another quality product to come out from the indie landscape that not only works as a thrilling comedy but also as an insightful coming of age drama that attempts to cut through the stereotype associated with the society it focuses on.Dope tells the story of Malcolm; a high school senior who's wary of modern tech yet whose heart lies in the hip-hop culture of the 1990s.
Famuyiwa's direction is just as good as his writing and he does an excellent job in showing the difficulty an African-American faces not just from others but from his own community as well.The technical aspects are brilliantly executed and further amplify the look & feel of the story with its dynamic camera-work, clever editing & fitting music but it's the characters who add a lively, zesty element to it.
Malcolm longs to get accepted to Harvard and leave his environment, but a few unexpected events (revolving around a pretty girl, of course) sets him and his two best friends on a new course that may derail his hopes or help him to get to where he needs to go.Dope mixes a love for 90's hip-hop, intelligent kids, being yourself, and making a way for yourself in difficult situations.
And whatever happened to their band that had quite good music?It started out as an original movie with an amusing tone but ended up with 2D characters that you come to despise.
There's a moment near the end of Dope, the new comedy from Rick Famuyiwa, when the main character Malcolm is giving a sort of monologue to the camera.
But before this, Dope is one of the most enjoyably daffy movies of the summer, in the best possible way: it's a comedy of errors about the school nerds getting by accident/chance/happenstance a bag of drugs, but it takes its characters seriously enough that we want to follow along on the ride.
And at first it almost seems like it may take place over just a day or two given how fast things escalate for these three characters (aside from Malcolm are friends Jib and Diggy, also outsiders at an Inglewood high school).It actually goes further than that, and more complex, and the director doesn't lose his footing much at all thanks to his script.
Of course Malcolm and his friends have that sort of nerdy/hipster side to them, so there's plenty of 90's hip-hop ("The golden age", as one of the teens says, and they may be right), plus some old-school soul (Gil Scott Heron) and sorta-metal (Korn!) It's the kind of selection of songs, also featuring Pharell Williams (hey, again, 2015 right), that is just wonderful and adds so much flavor and bounce to everything that's going on.A great movie?
"It's hard out there for a geek" and Dope is as geeky as the tag line makes it out to be.Three seniors in high school share a close pack (as well as a hipsterish rock band) due to their overzealous love of 90s hip hop, which main character, Malcolm feels happened between Public Enemy's, it It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back (released in 1988) and Jay-Z's, the Blue print (released in 2001).Dope in itself is a geek fest for the filmmakers as it pays the perfect tribute to movies of the 1990's (especially early 1990's) influenced by the music at the time.From the poster I saw of the film I was expecting something light, but the movie gets real heavy at times as well.
My personal favorite was when they used the Instrumental from the Korn song, Blind during a drug using sequence (Only someone who calls themselves a 90s Hip Hop geek would add this).I can't help but to think that Pharrel probably sees a lot of himself in Malcolm, a geek who somehow is not black enough because his mind is open to other things outside his own environment (an issue I feel all good artist should have).
First, the cool look of some of its characters; second, the references to 90's hip hop; and finally it felt like for once, a movie with people from a bad neighborhood wasn't based on just shooting guys right left and center.
Don't get it twisted, this isn't some sob story cliché movie, this is Dope.Malcolm (Shameik Moore) is a self proclaimed hip-hop geek, he's got his two close friends (played by Tony Revolori and Kiersey Clemons) and his dreams, but getting out and into Harvard doesn't look too likely.
By the end of the movie, I was noticing a lot of things that made me wonder if the Malcolm character was loosely based on a modern figure that all of us know.1.
His most recent film is also the best film so far and is also the film with a number of young energy secretary first film of a young director who is not afraid try and experiment.The actor who plays Mike Moore, Malcolm was doing a great job but irritatingly he looked like perfect casting an action movie with his meticulous abdominal muscles and not an outstanding student every day solves mathematical formulas, dealing with physics and read books.
'DOPE': Four and a Half Stars (Out of Five)A coming of age crime-comedy flick; about a geek high school student, who's about to graduate, that becomes involved in a life threatening drug-caper (along with his two best friends).
A Good Film with Too much 'Dope' and not Enough Geek Malcolm, Diggy and Jib are not your average kids, no matter what neighborhood they come from.
Except that, the movie is great, we dive easily into this hip hop culture and it is quite funny, but the ending is completely WTF and the geek aspect of Malcolm's character fails considerably..
These 3 teens have to practically run for their lives, And the main character (who knows NOTHING about drug dealing) has to concoct a plan to sell the stash for a profit.Also, I liked that this was nearly an all black cast film: and a really good one.Bizarre stuff - was worth my time..
Dope is one of my favorite films because i feel as though a lot of people can relate to this movie in some way.