Hustle and Flow

Starring Terrence Howard, Anthony Anderson, Taryn Manning, Taraji P. Henson, DJ Qualls and Ludacris

Written and directed by Craig Brewer

Here’s how manipulative Hustle and Flow is: as the New York Times recently pointed out in a piece that spent a lot of time stating the obvious, it makes a hero out of a pimp. Terrence Howard (who also played the unhinged director in Crash) stars as DJay, a Memphis hustler with a couple of fillies in his stable and a side business selling pot— “I’m strictly gateway,” he says to a customer looking for harder drugs. In his own way, DJay is as hardworking as any entrepreneur. The hours suck. You have to keep the bitches in line and keep the cops and the johns from fucking up your shit. And these days, pimping doesn’t exactly make you rich or score you the tricked-out Caddy. You make enough to pay rent on a two-bedroom shack so your ho’s and their squalling babies have a place to sleep, and that’s it. But in his own way, DJay’s living the dream.

But like most of us, DJay also harbors secret ambitions. He keeps a notebook full of his own rap lyrics, and follows the career of hometown boy made good Skinny Black (Ludacris), who used to rap from the heart but now spends his time on TV shucking and jiving for his corporate masters. One day DJay attends a gospel music recording session at the invitation of his sound engineer buddy Key (Anthony Anderson), and he is moved to tears. In a transformation not unlike that undergone by Jake and Elwood in The Blues Brothers, DJay suddenly understands his mission in life: to rap his message to the world. As God is his witness, he will pimp no more.

With the help of Key and token white-boy mixmaster Shelby (DJ Qualls), DJay scrounges up recording equipment, sets up a makeshift egg-carton studio and goes to work. Soon everyone in his life, hooker and friend alike, gets sucked into orbit around his ambition; Shug (Taraji P. Henson), a hooker pregnant with his child, gets drafted to sing the chorus for his first would-be hit, “Whoop That Trick” (original title: “Beat That Bitch”). When DJay needs a new microphone for the studio, he dispatches skinny white-girl ho Nola (Taryn Manning) to work over a pawnshop dealer. He stops referring to the girls as his bitches and starts calling them his “primary investors.” His plan: to finish his track in time to get a tape to Skinny Black, who’s due to attend a private 4th of July party at a local bar owned by a friend who looks a lot like Isaac Hayes.

What so immediately put me in this film’s corner is the care with which writer-director Craig Brewer leaves you free to form your own opinions. DJay’s pimping isn’t rationalized or defended; you either accept that it’s possible for a pimp to redeem himself through his art, or you don’t. He isn’t a cliché— he’s often an asshole, and when one of his ho’s proves too much of a distraction from the recording process, he puts both her and her baby out on the street.

The film doesn’t judge DJay, but neither does it excuse him; in contrast it presents Key, another black man from the streets who nonetheless manages to make a living without selling blowjobs and dope. As played by Terrence Howard, DJay is both humble and vain, noble and craven, brimming with confidence and crippled by self-doubt. His performance is the mirror image of Emenem’s Rabbit in 8 Mile, it’s true— but whereas Rabbit was merely the long-form version of Marshall Mathers’ carefully crafted public persona, DJay is real enough that you can imagine running into him at the 7-Eleven.

Besides DJay, the script gives us a rich menu of supporting characters, each of whom enjoys a separate story arc. Characters who at first appear dimwitted or of no consequence show surprising reserves of intelligence and strength. Like Jesus, the film preaches the gospel that even the bitterest dregs of society are worthy of love and capable of redemption, and it understands the true cost and meaning of judge not. No one in this picture ends up where they started, and that makes the journey all the richer.

But man, does this movie work you over. The script is cut like a glittering diamond, every facet angled just so to dazzle you with DJay’s plight. The scenes in which DJay, Key and Shelby work out “Whoop That Trick”— a shamelessly poppy nugget about the trials of pimpin’ written by real-life Memphis rapper Al Kapone— make producing a hit hip-hop track look so easy that I left the theater ready to build a studio in my basement and start laying down beats. There are also a few moments when the picture veers perilously close to camp; the scene in which Shug presents DJay with his first piece of bling comes to mind. But by that time, you’re so invested in these characters that even these missteps are forgivable. To paraphrase Derek Smalls, there’s a fine line between stupid and clever.

What’s not forgivable are those critics— and you know who you are— who have questioned this picture’s ability to break out of the urban demographic. You people need to get your heads screwed on straight. Soul Plane was an “urban” film, made for no other reason than to suck money out of the hood. Hustle and Flow, by contrast, is a real film made by real filmmakers about complex characters that will appeal to anyone who loves good storytelling. Look, I’m as white of a white guy as it’s possible to get. To me, listening to 90 percent of rap is like getting Drano poured in my ear canals. But I’m a sucker for a good story, and Hustle and Flow has one to tell. It really is one of the best films of the year. If you avoid it because it’s too black for you, then you have bigger problems than I can help you with.

August 1, 2005
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