8 Miles to go before I sleep.

[rsadelle]

If you see 8 Mile, you may, as I did, think to yourself in the middle of it, "This movie is not all it's cracked up to be. Where's the greatness?" But stick it out, because it's only at the end that you can look at it as a whole and realize just how good it is.

The movie is visually beautiful, full of dark, gray backgrounds even in daylight and shot "on location in the 313." The rapping didn't quite live up to my expectations for cleverness and wordplay, but the rap-like cadence of the everyday speech more than made up for it. And, as should be expected, there are a few fascinating things going on in this movie.

First is the relationship between Rabbit (Eminem) and his family. While the movie never puts it in these terms, there's a moment where his mother (Kim Basinger) looks at him and I thought, "She sexually abused him." And while that may be the effect of watching Law & Order: SVU every week, the feeling of abuse stayed with me, and was reinforced in the way Rabbit does his best to protect Lily (Chloe Greenfield), his beloved baby sister. When Rabbit beats up his mother's boyfriend, Lily crawls under the table, and Rabbit gently coaxes her out when it's all over. His protectiveness is, according to one of the misguided reviews I read, supposed to bring out his softer side. What I saw was an abused older child trying to protect his younger sibling from the same thing.

Secondly, there's the Three One Third crew: Future (Mekhi Phifer), with whom Rabbit may be a little in love; Cheddar Bob (Evan Jones), who may be a little in love with, and clearly idolizes, Rabbit; DJ Iz (De'Angelo Wilson), who is the group's intellectual; and Sol George (Omar Benson Miller), whose response to DJ Iz is, "We're talking about Benjamins and Benzes, not BlueCross and BlueShield." Future and Cheddar Bob are the most interesting because they're the ones whose interactions with Rabbit are the most meaningful. Future wholeheartedly believes in Rabbit and his abilities, but he keeps warning Rabbit against getting involved with Wink (Eugene Byrd), who, he sees, is not as committed to Rabbit as he may appear. And if that wasn't a clear enough picture of their relationship, the camera turns around them in their half-handshake half-hugs to show us Rabbit's head leaning on Future's shoulder. Cheddar Bob provides the movie's comic relief, which is more than a little marred by the predictability of it all: In one run-in with Free World, Three One Third's opposing crew, one of the other members of the crew says, softly, "Fuck Free World." Cheddar Bob, predictably, yells, "Yeah, fuck Free World," after them, the audience of suburban white kids laughs, and a fight ensues. But there's a little more than just comic relief to Cheddar Bob. The crew tries to visit him while he's in recovery from his accidentally, and predictably, self-inflicted gunshot wound, but he refuses to answer the door. When Rabbit comes in to see why, he says, "I didn't want them to laugh at me," and looks completely delighted when Rabbit tells him that he understands.

The most interesting thing about the movie is, of course, Rabbit himself. There's no obvious, direct connection between the things that happen to him and the change in his character, but change he does, and we see, although I didn't realize it until later, the moment when it all begins. Rabbit starts to tell his boss, "It wasn't my fault," and says instead, "It won't happen again." Responsibility; that's what this movie is really about. The boy grows up, and at the end of the movie, he goes back to work. "Provide the right of type of life for my family" indeed.

Comments

[synicism.livejournal.com]

Huh.

Okay, I was fence-sitting, but I'm definitely gonna go see it now.

[rsadelle]

Definitely go see it. It's worth the money.