Christ & Compton
A Christian Perspective on The Hit Film
Dimensions
I wanted to enjoy this film; I really did. I expected so much more of
Gray. For everything in the film for which I needed to cover my eyes, I
expected there to be a matching moment that provided a balanced view.
Instead of the caricature of an angry boyfriend searching for his girl
and chased off by the NWA crew, that moment could have belonged to a
distraught father or mother looking for their child. Instead of the
cartoonish confrontation between Dr. Dre and the boyfriend, there could
have been a moment—just one, somewhere in this mess, where Dre is
challenged by the dad, by the mom: “Son… do you even understand the
damage you are doing?”
There isn’t even one decent cop in this movie, which is, of course,
ridiculous. Ninety-eight hundred men and women on the Los Angeles Police
force, and you’re telling me there could not have been even one single
good cop or, at least, one cop who wasn’t behaving like a
mustache-twirling, over-the-top caricature? Not even one cop who could
have stood up for the boys or even counseled them? Is that even
possible?
The morality of band leader Eazy-E’s drug slinging is never even
questioned, and Wright himself is portrayed as an overly-trusting and
ultimately poor businessman taken advantage of by manager Jerry Heller,
played with barely-hidden embarrassment by veteran character actor Paul
Giamatti. The one-note Heller is a head-shakingly bad caricature, as is
R. Marcos Taylor’s villainous Suge Knight, who does way too much with
his eyes, making Knight seem startled by every little thing. I do not
know Mr. Knight, but in virtually all video footage I’ve ever seen of
him, his public face is pure gangsta: laid back, in charge, no drama.
Gray, perhaps egged on by executive producers Ice Cube and Dr. Dre,
presents Knight as a villainous buffoon. Knight may indeed be the
former—he goes to great lengths to create and maintain that image—but a
buffoon the man is not.
It would have been more courageous to portray E as someone ultimately
consumed by ego who didn’t seem to lose a lot of sleep over the fact his
bandmates—particularly Dre, who was responsible for the band’s
groundbreaking production, and Ice Cube, who was the band’s most
thunderous voice and main songwriter—were literally not being paid.
Compton soft-pedals that conflict in an effort not to tarnish the halo
the film fits Eazy-E with. E tragically died of AIDS in 1995 but, in
Compton, not even a single band member or, for that matter, roadie, so
much as whispers a speculation about E’s sexual orientation.
Look, if that’s the truth, so be it: Eazy-E was a completely
heterosexual saint who was duped by Jerry Heller. I mean, sold. I have
no dog in the fight. But it’s still poor filmmaking to not go there,
even if it’s just to debunk such rumors. E is portrayed as having deep
affection and great loyalty to Heller, but not so much as a whisper or
rumor about how far that affection extended.
For a film that goes so hard and relentlessly at law enforcement, it
pulls virtually every punch in its untoward whitewashing of its young
protagonists. No bunch of kids are this perfect, this congenial, this
nice. Get On Up portrayed the late great James Brown as something of an
ass. Yes, the film certainly rounded the edges off of Black America’s
titular funk Godfather, but it also allowed James to breathe honest air:
he wasn’t perfect. He wasn’t a great businessman, either. He mistreated
some people and he wasn’t the best husband or father.
We see none of those dimensions—actually, no dimensions at all—in
Compton, which ironically settles for whitewash in a film allegedly
about “truth” within the context of a “free speech” movement that
purports to portray an unvarnished “reality.” It amazes me how Gray and
company can roll out escapist pornographic propaganda and successfully
position it within the media as an “important” film about free speech.
Heroes: Adoring fans cheering two guys who made millions off of misogyny and murder.
Your Kids Will See This
There are shocking moments of soft-core pornography in this, a film your
kids absolutely will see, regardless of whether or not you permit
it. I’m not talking
about the errant exposed nipple or two, or even full-frontal nudity. I’m
talking about black girls, seemingly barely of age, demeaning themselves
by performing (what I hope are) simulated sex acts. In SOC, we see only
one point of view: cops are bad, naked teenage black girls are fun. So
they lined up hundreds of hopeful, starry-eyed kids only years out of
Tickle Me Elmo and Easy Bake ovens and put them in G-strings or less;
the girls wiggling obscenely for Mr. Gray in hopes of launching a film
career. In what way does this make Cube and Dre better than Suge Knight?
Cube, Dre: you guys had a real opportunity to make a profound statement.
You blew it. Of course, your stacks of cash will be so high you might
not notice or care.
Christopher J. Priest
23 August 2015
editor@praisenet.org
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