Daily Mail's "Notorious" Review

Peyton Manning

What an absolute prick writing this article. Doesn't know a thing about hip-hop.

Biggie (played by first-time actor Jamal Woolard) was a fat, foul-mouthed, sexist, talentless, gun-toting drug-dealer from Brooklyn, who followed his dream - of turning himself into a fat, foul-mouthed, sexist, talentless, gun-toting millionaire rapper.

Fans of Biggie, whose two albums sold in their millions, one of them posthumously, are bound to admire the movie's hip-hop soundtrack more than I did.

But even some of them may be able to spot that the screenplay is lazy, dull and formulaic, recycling cliches from previous rapper flicks, such as 8 Mile, Hustle & Flow and Get Rich Or Die Tryin'.

The senior U.S. film critic Roger Ebert describes Biggie, in a moment of sublime political correctness, as 'a gifted writer'. I would beg to differ.

Most of Biggie's lyrics are a witless procession of sexual boasting, juvenile insults, four-letter words and the kind of criminal posturing that has led too many from his background to early and unnecessary deaths.

One example may suffice: 'Money, hos and clothes Blunt smoke comin' out the nose, Is all a nigga knows.
Flippin' on foes, puttin' tags on toes, Watchin' the stash grow, Clockin' the cashflow.'

Such sentiments mark him out, if I may be permitted to descend into Cockney rhyming slang, as a banker.

Quite apart from Biggie's unhealthy obsession with greed and weed, bitches and satisfying his itches, he also seems to have suffered from the unfortunate delusion that 'Wallace' rhymes with 'knowledge

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/reviews/article-1144037/Notorious-Hes-B-I-G-hes-clever.html

Orizio

Its the Daily Mail, its a fascist pile of ****, no suprises.

Boom_Bap

To be honest, i dont think that the majority of Mail readers are the target audience for Notorious.

Anyone seen it yet? I havent myself but i'd say it's something worth looking into. I just hope that P.Diddy has made it into a movie about Biggie and not a movie about him with some biggie cameos.

tossy

Its the daily mail? why are you surprised and why are you buying it! what Dianne related story did they have on the cover this week?

It is to journalism what D12 are to hip hop

herbieflowers

Most of that review is accurate, though the tone and manner, and the fact that the film's merits were, by and large, ignored, leave a lot to be desired.

phenomenon

I saw the movie today and I absolutely loved it. You don't even have to be a hip-hop fan to enjoy it, but it definitely helps It's fun recognising the characters and naturally the soundtrack was amazing.

The reviewer obviously has a chip on his shoulder about rap music. He talks more about Biggie as a person rather than the actual film. Ignore it - 5/5 for the film imo.

tossy

phenomenon wrote: »

I saw the movie today and I absolutely loved it. You don't even have to be a hip-hop fan to enjoy it, but it definitely helps It's fun recognising the characters and naturally the soundtrack was amazing.

The reviewer obviously has a chip on his shoulder about rap music. He talks more about Biggie as a person rather than the actual film. Ignore it - 5/5 for the film imo.

If you weren't a hip hop fan you wouldn't recognise the characters or enjoy the soundtrack.Early reports of this film were good but any trailer ive seen has turned me off it,i just need to find time to watch it now!!

Pen1987

Pretty accurate summary.

Camac Hibs

the daily mail is a dirty tory rag dinnae mind it. The boy was a lyrical genius regardless of the content. Typical of such piece of ****e to hold the likes of biggie personally responsible for the ills of society his rhymes reflected.

Pen1987

Lyrical genius my hole, he was a decent rapper who was noticeably overweight, hung around with other rappers, released one album, got shot, died, became more famous had another album released post-posthumously and is now considered a rap God.

phenomenon

Pen1987 wrote: »

Lyrical genius my hole, he was a decent rapper who was noticeably overweight, hung around with other rappers, released one album, got shot, died, became more famous had another album released post-posthumously and is now considered a rap God.

Obvious troll is obvious.
1/10. Try harder next time, bud.

Boom_Bap

phenomenon wrote: »

Obvious troll is obvious.
1/10. Try harder next time, bud.

Not quite...Pen1987 is one of the decent posters on the HipHop forum. Although i dont completely agree with his view, there is some truth in what he is saying.
Biggie is no lyrical genius, he wrote some good stories, put some good words together and was able to carry what he was saying over the beat in a unique way. He had solid producers behind him to boot and excellent promotion from his label. Before i get bashed....i really like Biggie, own his albums, i think that Who Shot Ya? is up there in the top 20 hip hop songs ever but i wouldnt call him a lyrical genius.

To put this another way, if Biggie's career was starting now, do you think that he would escalate to the same heights of what he did achieve while alive? We will never know the answer to this but i dont think he would. He appeared on the scene in the right time and right place with the right people and right promotion. This is a time when hip hop was calling out for someone like him, The Source seen him and pushed him in a big way, this was when the Source was the Mecca for Hip Hop (They even gave life after death 5 mics). He has even helped to define what commercial hip hop is today with talk of bling, guns, prestige and the whatnot.

Also as Pen1987 mentioned, he was killed, this helped improve his album sales, for some reason people see someone who is dead as a more credible artist than while alive...see Tupac, Bob Marley, Johnny Cash, John Lennon, Big L, Nirvana (Kurt Cobain).......
not saying that they didnt have a following while alive, but album sales for each rocketed after death and populatrity increased.

Nolanger

Daily Mail is a traditionally right-wing newspaper so no surprises it doesn't like black rappers.
Thought the movie was nothing special anyway - no classic.
Needed a more visceral director.

Pen1987

phenomenon wrote: »

Obvious troll is obvious.
1/10. Try harder next time, bud.

Obvious person who has little knowledge of hip-hop's sales history and bases their opinion on "lyrical genius" on a persons ability to write rhyming double-entrandres... is obvious.

Nolanger wrote: »

Daily Mail is a traditionally right-wing newspaper so no surprises it doesn't like black rappers.
Thought the movie was nothing special anyway - no classic.
Needed a more visceral director.

Hardly a racist review. Although I dislike the Mail as much as the next sane man, the write up makes some good points.

Parrish_Crooks

I think we're all over simplifying Biggie on both sides. He wasn't the greatest of all time who saved the East Coast. Alternatively, he wasn't a talentless waste of space either. Biggie was a great storyteller. As well as this, there was something about his voice that made it addictive to llisten to. He was also a change from the sex symbols of LL Cool J, Jodeci and 2pac, he looked different and didn't purport to be anything else that a fat thug from around the neighbourhood.

Biggie also had a lot of luck on his side. He had (Hate him or love him) one of the greatest promoter/record executive/businessmen on his side in Puff Daddy. This would lead to label promotion, great marketing, and great shows. He had great production on his side; Premo, Easy Mo Bee, The Hitmen. He also came along at a time when the East Coast was taking back hip-hop from the West coast. Anyone who says Biggie single handedly did this with Ready To Die should note that the same year saw the release of both Illmatic and Enter the Wu-Tang: The 36 Chambers. Largely because of Puff's involvement though, Ready To Die would reach the largest audience. He mastered the art (Approve of this or not) of appealing to both the mainstream, and the hardcore hip-hop heads. There was something for everybody. Listen to Gimme The Loot or warning for example, then listen to Juicy and Big Poppa.

Biggie also got lucky (For a few years at least), as he was given so much attention by Tupac. Biggie and Tupac became the faces of the East/West media fuelled beef. Nothing sells records like controversy, and this feud would make Biggie immortal. His second album was poor, in my opinion. The rawnes, griminess and hopelessness which made the first album so engaging was replaced with a shiny, polished 'We made it' sound. Easy Mo Bee was gone also, which Didn't help. The album contained some good tracks, like Kick in the Door, but the rest was lazy and filled with made for club anthems.

Biggie also got lucky in that he hailed from Brooklyn. No other borough has the pride, (or the population) of Brooklyn. IN Biggie they had one of their own representing. An ex drug dealer, an ordinary boy from the hood.

So yes, the reviewer is an idiot. He simplifies and generalises. And besides the obvious Hollywood schmaltz present at some points in the movie, it was pretty accurate, and I quite enjoyed it.

ghostface ste

Just got back from seeing this.... there's 2hours of my life i won't get back Acting and music wise was quite good. Script was appallingly bad and so cheesy in parts it was unbelievable (usually for lines from puffy). I think it is quite clear that there is a huge influenece on the film from Puff and BIG's mother being producers on the film.

I'm not sure about the point above about it being very accurate either, i think generally it is but a lot of stuff is out of context and his relationship with Pac seems to have been just thrown in there for no reason.

Anyway, Who Shot Ya - what a song....

galwayfeen

wow,never knew a paper could publish such a hateful review,i seen "notorious" few times now and although i'm a fan of mr.wallace,the film definately had its problems,first,like someone mentioned,it was produced with the help of ms.wallace,no problems with that but really she wasn't with B.I.G. all of his life.casting was terrible except for the people who played B.I.G.,lil'kim and faith,sure pac looks like some other person were it not for the thug life beanie:rolleyes:,wonder what stopped puff,lil'cease from playing themselves?.just like duets and born again,it was a smart way too make money off him,but still was great film that took you back to the golden age of hip hop.i wont bother with the so called "beef" but i will say that big was no "dumb" lyricist,he knew from early on that he needed those juicy's and hypnotize's.a documentary came out the same time as the film called "rap phenomenon", some real interviews and all that,
sooooo when's the 2pac movie comin' out?:rolleyes:

ghostface ste

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0303356/ Skip Notorious and watch this instead, been a while since I saw it but from what i remember was really good.

Parrish_Crooks

ghostface ste wrote: »

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0303356/ Skip Notorious and watch this instead, been a while since I saw it but from what i remember was really good.

+1.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0343121/ is also a great doc. Was nominated at the oscars a few years ago, told in his own words, really well done.