Movie Review: Fruitvale Station

If you asked me what my biggest fear of dying was I would tell you drowning but in watching Fruitvale Station I remembered that I have an even bigger fear than drowning - dying in transition.

Fruitvale Station is the account of Oscar Grant's (Michael B. Jordan) last day on earth leading up to being shot and killed by BART police on New Year's Day 2009. The movie was pieced together by points of contact Oscar had on that fateful day via his cell phone. In between text messages and phone calls, Oscar was taking steps away from dealing marijuana toward living a life in which he could always be there for his daughter, Tatiana.

By knowing how the movie would end, it was tortuous watching the events of the day that put Oscar in BART custody at Fruitvale Station. Family events, positive events, new lease on life events. Oscar resolved, through actions, not to carry the mistakes of his previous years into 2009 only to be muted by the bang of a gunshot. It was a poetic injustice for Oscar to be killed during his transition while the world was in one of its own into a new year.

Move to Mars

"I'm bout to move to Mars y'all/ the world a mess"

I didn't realize how blessed I was as a kid until I moved out on my own after college. And in that youth I listened to the likes of Goodie Mob, Outkast, and Pastor Troy just bobbing to the beat and reciting lyrics that were mere words to me. But now those lyrics carry weight that I couldn't comprehend in middle and high school. Pastor Troy's "Move to Mars" was one of those songs that was just words to a dope beat to me at 16 but after not hearing that song for years now the lyrics are an epiphany to me of social/politically charged song.

Movie Review: Pacific Rim

Do you know what the success or fail of Pacific Rim at the box office means? It holds the future of live-action Mecha movies in the balance! Robotech, Gundam, Voltron, Aquarion, and the list goes on!

Giggity!

Here's the rundown: Aliens, dubbed "kaiju", from another universe emerge from a trans-dimensional breach in the Pacific ocean and lay waste to coastal cities. The world's governments work together to build a unit of giant robotic soldiers, Jaegers, controlled by the neural impulses of two pilots using "Drift" technology. But when the attacks escalate and as more pilots are killed former ranger and Jaeger pilot Raleigh Becket (Charlie Hunnam) must suit up again to make one last stand against the coming extinction.

Giant Robots + Giant Aliens = Dopeness, absolute dopeness! Or |Dopeness| for you math geeks. And for the record there was more "suit" in Pacific Rim than the entire Iron Man franchise! (I'm looking real hard at you, Marvel Studios!)