Our friends at Ambrosia For Heads are at it again. They’ve turned on their time machine and taken us back to the 90’s, when the music and films of urban America were hard, gritty, complex and classic.
As a part of the 2015 Brooklyn Hip-Hop Festival, The Dummy Clap Film Festival will be hosting a special screening of the 1994 film Fresh. The film, which turns 21-years old in August, is perhaps the most underrated of a series of classic Hip-Hop themed films from the 1990s, which included Boyz N the Hood, Menace II Society, Juice and more.
If Boyz N the Hood was seen as an extension of its star Ice Cube, with its bold portrayal of life in the hood,Fresh was the equivalent of Wu Tang Clans GZAfiercely intelligent, with a quiet intensity that potentially caused it to be overlooked. Fittingly, Freshs soundtrack featured three Wu-Tang Clan songs. While the Boaz Yakin film was critically-acclaimed, its box office reception of $8MM paled in comparison to those of some of its more high profile peers.
Fresh was a multi-layered film. It was part coming of age story, part revenge flick and part guide for how to survive in the hood, all using Chess as a metaphor. Its cast was also a whos who of extraordinarily gifted thespians before they achieved their commercial peaks. Samuel L. Jackson was months away from his breakout role in Pulp Fiction, and Giancarlo Esposito, though a mainstay in Spike Lee films, would not receive his career-defining role as Breaking Bads Gus for another 15 years. NBushe Wright would also go on to reach greater fame in Dead Presidents and Blade.
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