In 8 Mile, Curtis Hanson brings inner-city Detroit to life
in all its real-life shambles. The buildings look war-torn, crumbling, paint fading,
deserted. Ghosts of the 60's race riots lurk in the shadows of abandoned houses. There is
very little traffic on the streets, except for the junk cars coughing and sputtering as
their drivers go looking for, or perhaps running from, trouble. Occasionaly,
we see a cop car.
In this context, Hanson introduces us to Jimmy Smith, better known to
his friends (and Mom) as “Bunny Rabbit”. Bunny Rabbit is played by Eminem.
Armed with excellent cinematography, a brooding hip-hop soundtrack,
and a cast of talented actors that includes Kim Basinger, Mekhi Phifer (O, Clockers, TV's
E.R.), Brittany Murphy (the voice of LuAnn on TV's King of the Hill) and
Michael Shannon (Vanilla Sky), Hanson makes this into a compelling coming-of-age
tale that draws in the crowd and gets them cheering. Then again, it's also his most
predictable and formulaic film.
Rabbit is not much of a stretch for Eminem as an actor, insofar as he
is familiar with that life and those pressures. He did grow up in Detroit, and he did make
a name for himself in the rap scene there at places like "The Shelter", where
the film's main rap confrontations take place. Still, it's one thing to know about your
character and another thing to make that character watchable and sympathetic. Eminem rises
to the challenge of playing a scared, vulnerable kid cornered by hardship and mustering
the guts to fight back. He's quite good. His performance will make him a movie star, no
doubt about it. He seems right at home with the character. Hanson puts him front and
center, and Eminem gives us a character who is somehow likeable in spite of his mouth.
But what a mouth.
8 Mile is this year’s Rocky, or better, it’s The
Karate Kid 5. Eminem is a jittery version of Ralph Macchio, but this Kid has no Mr.
Miyagi. He's on his ow. His “martial art” does not involve fists, although he
does throw punches aplenty in the film’s 112 minutes. His weapons are his
rhymes — or more specifically, means-spirited degrading, sarcastic, ego-busting rhymes.
Introducing the first big screen hero of bad language, a punk kid who would rather beat
other punks at their own game than rise above them with better behavior. This film’s
built-in audience isn’t inspired by nobility; they’re cheering at calculating
acts of humiliation and slander.
Now, to be fair, this is the language of the streets, the stuff
Rabbit has grown up hearing. It’s believable and honest that he would talk like the
rest of his community. After all, they’re all poor, and nobody looks out for their
well-being in any more personal way than the occasional passing cop car. I’ve spent
enough time around young people on the wrong side of town to know that, yes, this is the
way most young people in those circumstances communicate. Their language reflects their
lack of education and their familiarity with violence, hunger, and broken families. Life
has treated them like a punching bag. They’ve seen violence and suffered violence and
now that they’re growing up, they’re learning to fight back.
It’s hard not to sympathize with a kid whose home is a trailer,
whose mother (Kim Basinger, de-glamorized and snarling) is promiscuous and emotionally
crippled, and who works long hours at miserable jobs. School isn’t even a topic of
discussion. He’s watching his little sister grow up neglected, frightened, and
lonely. His friends aren’t loyal, and the girls he has to choose from are
mean-spirited, desperate, presenting themselves as sex toys because they believe that is
the only card they have to play to win money and security. How could you not root for a
kid who grows up in that kind of garbage?
As predictable as this formula is, Hanson makes it all so real that I
found myself rooting for Rabbit. Thus, it was distressing to discover that the movie has
very different ideas than I do about an honorable response to these obstacles. The movie
celebrates Rabbit’s talent for mean-spirited put-downs, and seems to suggest that the
only hope for him is to recognize that he can’t trust anybody. To “grow
up,” he must swallow the fact that he is alone in the universe, and he walks off into
the sunset like John Wayne armed with rapid-fire, mean-spirited put-downs for any
occasion.
Rabbit does indeed have some heroic qualities. He clearly has love
for his mother and his sister, and he has friends of different colors. He spends
time with social rejects and sticks up for the downtrodden. He looks past race issues and
appeals to community spirit in order to bring people together united against their unnamed
oppressors. And he’s a great rapper. Rap as a style of music is full of
possibilities, energy, and complexity. In the hands of a humble visionary like Lauryn
Hill, it can be as elevating as gospel. But like anything, it can be used in the wrong
ways, for the wrong reasons. And the thing that makes Rabbit a questionable hero for me is
this — he does not hesitate to use rap as a weapon.
In Unforgiven, Clint Eastwood is the world’s greatest
gunslinger who realizes that gunslinging is a wicked life and he’s got to get out of
it. When he takes up his rifle for “one last time,” we watch his spirit consumed
by the hatred and violence that comes with the job. It’s a tragedy. 8 Mile
takes a different approach: Our young hero aims his sharp tongue and opens fire, and the
audience celebrates. He basically proves he's the meanest dog on the block, and he can
out-bark and out-bite anybody, even if he has to put himself down to do it.
I'm reminded of Tom Cruise’s character in Magnolia, the
misogynistic, chauvinistic, gutter-mouthed motivational speaker in Magnolia who learned the wages of his sins the hard
way. We are left believing that maybe he will change his life. Bunny Rabbit is like that
character, but this movie’s idea of success would be to give Bunny Rabbit that job in
the spotlight without bothering to suggest he clean up his act. (And isn’t that
exactly what has happened to Eminem?)
What is really disturbing is that the crowd of Eminem fans cheer
wildly through the film as he concocts expletive-ridden diatribes against his enemies. I
fear that the quieter moments when Rabbit shows humility and compassion for others will be
drowned out by this culminating orgy of profanity and put-downs.
Some critics have said it’s a good thing that these kids are
going at each other with words instead of weapons. Sure
— at least nobody ends up dead.
But are they growing as individuals if they work at becoming more eloquent in the language
of hate? This “hero’s” behavior is not something
I’d want my kids to learn from and imitate.
Nor do I want them learning what this film passes off as
“life-lessons.”
Basically, 8 Mile shows us that Rabbit can’t trust
anybody — not his mother, not his girlfriends, not his friends. Women are lying,
cheating creatures who lure poor innocent men into their clutches with sex, and then stab
them in the back. His mother is a selfish mean-spirited alcoholic. His ex-girlfriend is a
liar. His new girlfriend is suspicious, and after the film has given them a long,
indulgent, celebratory sex scene, the movie then shows her up as a serpent. (Thus the
film shows young guys that sex with girls is exhilarating, erotic, and perfectly
okay as long as you don’t trust the one you’re with.) The only girl who gets off
clean is the five-year old, but think about it — who have her role models been? A
prostitute mother and a promiscuous, violent brother. Before long, she’ll be pregnant
and lonely.
The grownup world proves to be just ruthless and backstabbing as the
women. A young person has to rely solely on himself and his talent, and he’d better
be talented enough to make it to the top on his own, or he’s screwed.
It also portrays gang activity dishonestly. Are we really so naïve
as to accept that when somebody pulls a gun in a gang battle, both sides stop fighting,
they all get very concerned, and they treat the gunslinger like a complete idiot? Huh-uh.
I am interested to see how hip-hop and rap fans respond to this film.
The crowd of enthusiastic youths at our screening ate it up. But isn’t it rather
insulting? How many films have there been about hip-hop and rap? Why is this the big
breakthrough film on the subject? What makes it so special?
The rapper is white. Plain and simple.
Isn’t it strange that, at the end of the movie, the white guy
who has learned the music and art of black culture is the one who finally transcends it
and shows the promise of success? All of the black characters are in awe of him by the
end. The only black who gets out of the ghetto is the backstabbing Judas who has been
corrupted by the evils of the commercial music industry. And the only black character
portrayed as being educated is treated like a fool. He’s called “Frederick
Douglas” as though that was slander. It’s not just the community that laughs at
him, but the camera too. No... only the white man, who deserves our compassion and
sympathy in this dangerously “dark” environment, has any chance of attaining an
admirable and worthwhile life.
This is as bleak as evolutionary dramas get. It’s survival of
the fittest indeed, and you’re only going to be “fittest” if you harden
your heart and learn to be eloquently mean-spirited in order to defend you and yours. It
is a good and honest thing to portray young people who are growing up in broken homes, in
poverty, without good role models. Movies shouldn’t lie to its viewers about the
world we live in. But it also needs to be honest when it offers solutions. Bunny
Rabbit’s courage and talent might earn him a larger platform, popularity, money, and
an audience. But his behavior will not bring him peace or heal his wounds. It will only
stir up a generation to admire him and start practicing hateful, violent rants of their
own.
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