Brown Sugar
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DVD details
Actor: Sanaa Lathan, Taye DiggsBrand: Fox
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 109 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-02-11
Audience Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: 20th Century Fox
DVD Reviews of Brown Sugar
DVD Review: "So, when did you fall in love with hip hop?"
Summary: 5 Stars
Enjoyment of this film doesn't hinge on how much you dig hip hop music or how deep or how far back your history with hip hop goes. 2002's BROWN SUGAR works just fine as a romantic film, and it's cool if you relish it solely for that. But if you love hip hop or even if you just have a nodding acquaintance with it, then you'll get so much more from the movie. Me, I grew up in the '80s, listening to what's referred to nowadays as old school hip hop. So I can definitely get with the opening sequence, which features real-life hip hop luminaries being interviewed and divulging their musical inspirations. I've been listening to these cats from the get-go (Big Daddy Kane, Kool G Rap, De La Soul, etc.), and to set eyes on them in this flick, well, it's a very cool thing... I just wish Erik B. and Rakim had made an appearance (Rakim, to this day, is still my favorite emcee).
Well-respected magazine editor Sidney Shaw's first question in her interviews is always: "When did you fall in love with hip hop?" This not only reveals Sidney's deep, abiding ardor for this music genre but as well the underlying theme of the movie. How she herself fell in love with hip hop is established in a flashback set in 1984 in the boogie-down Bronx, as young Sidney and a little boy named Dre witness legendary rappers Dana Dane, Slick Rick, and Doug E. Fresh engaged in a rhyming battle. Sidney and Dre would grow up as lifelong friends, with their passion for hip hop inspiring them in their life choices and serving to keep them tightly connected.
Now Sidney and Dre are grown up, nearing thirty and successful in their careers. Sidney was an L.A. Times columnist, but now has moved back to New York as an influential magazine editor. She's never lost her integrity. Dre Ellis is a record label executive, and he's sold out a bit, bartering some of his ideals about hip hop for upward mobility and that good old green. Dre is about to be married to a beautiful girl. He's still best friends with Sidney. The plot gets going from there.
I really like this movie. It's romantic as hell, and told with intelligence and warmth and humor. And, sorry, but I can't help but compare it to the amazing Love and Basketball (New Line Platinum Series), partly because of the shared themes - with the friendship-into-romance arc being the most salient - and partly because both films star the luminous Sanaa Lathan. BROWN SUGAR and LOVE & BASKETBALL simply make good bookend movies.
Metaphors, now. In Sidney's voice-overs, she often presents a parallel between hip hop and her best friend Dre. This is done in a way which is interesting and insightful and heartfelt, and I really enjoyed this storytelling device. Particularly telling was Sidney's equating the "union of hip-hop to the mainstream" to Dre's wedding to his vanilla-type girlfriend Reese. And when Sidney professes her love for hip hop, the subtext is clear enough.
The cast clicks. Lathan's natural beauty, combination of strength and vulnerability, and marvelously grounded acting. Taye Diggs' magnetic presence and playful personality. Together, they create a very personal space, a cozy comfort level. Whenever Sanaa and Taye are in the same scene, everyone else seems to fade away. This is chemistry at its best.
Queen Latifah as Sidney's outgoing best friend and Mos Def as a laid back cabbie/emcee add solid support. Queen Latifah, as most folks know, used to be a strong emcee herself, before devoting her career to film acting. Mos Def, to me, can do no wrong. Dude is a sublime hip hop artist and so natural as an actor (Something the Lord Made, The Italian Job (Special Collector's Edition)). When Dre, in starting his own label, looks to sign Mos Def's character, he couldn't have found someone who embodied real hip hop more. Mos adds huge depth and credibility to this film; and he even performs on stage in it. Mos's scenes with Diggs and Queen Latifah are fabulous. Just keep an ear out for Mos and Taye's priceless conversation about Humphrey Bogart and Casablanca and walking off into the fog.
It's one disc, one side with the widescreen, the flipside with the full screen. Bonus features include: commentary by the director and the film editor (with the director's tendency to chuckle a lot getting to be this side of annoying); four deleted scenes with optional commentary (the scene "Poppin' in the Park," which shouldn't have been cut out, is terrific for Lathan and Diggs's cute pop-locking and their discourse on who the best emcees and djs are); two great music videos: Erykah Badu's "Love Of My Life" (featuring Common and MC Lyte) and Mos Def's "Brown Sugar" (featuring Faith Evans); and, of course, the theatrical trailer.
I also listen to other stuff, so as much as I love hip hop, I don't know that I'd call it the love of my life. I'd say that hip hop is more an off-and-on girlfriend. But, sometimes, I still get very much in the mood to listen to hip hop; I still try to keep track of who's who and what's what. I still bug out to Rakim's "I Know You Got Soul" and KRS-One's "My Philosophy." BROWN SUGAR is a wonderful love story, yep. But it's also a sincere valentine to a mean street musical artform which was triviliazed by most and, in its infancy, not given any sort of chance to grow and thrive. And how very wrong, the doubters and the haters. That there's even a movie like BROWN SUGAR around today is a testament to hip hop's popularity and longevity. And hip hop is not about to slow its roll.
Description of Brown Sugar
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