Once again the wrath of the urban oppression film. I've seen this story way too many times, and it kills me just how often the story is set in a high school. Stand and Deliver, Music of the Heart, Lean on Me, anyone?
These stories can work sometimes (like the rather enjoyable Lean on Me), but for that to happen, it must seem original. Light It Up has taken so much from the recent film The Negotiator, cramming it into the Dangerous Minds mentality, that the whole film seems hackneyed. Not once did I feel that I was in anything near suspense. Everything was inadvertently mapped out in the prologue (though it takes a very good eye to catch half the foreshadowing, a virtue and a debit that comes after seeing so many films with twists over a lifetime). The narration, the setting, the acting, everything seems familiar, because everything has been done a million times before.
The film is about the events that occur when a group of students take their school hostage. Not really everyone in the school, just the security guard (Whitaker) and the building. They are not trouble makers, gang members (with the exception of one), they are the students that the teachers like: the sportsman (Raymond), the quiet artist (Ri'chard), the A-list student (Dawson). And just for diversity there are the gang member (Starr), the pregnant loner girl (Gilbert), and the drug dealer (Collins, Jr.). They were provoked when the security guard begins to get rather impersonal with Ziggy, the quiet one, after the suspension of him and fellow students for standing up against the dismissal of their favorite teacher (Nelson).
Much of the film is a mess, little of it making any sense at all. The acting is horrendous, with the notable exception of Whitaker. Raymond gives one of the worst dramatic performances this year (and we must remember that there was always Casper Van Dien in The Omega Code). The direction and script both seem rather pushy, with crazy scenarios that are as incomprehensible as persistently poking one's self in the head with a pencil. I'd dare say that Light It Up is in the ranking for a contender for my bottom ten this year.
Rating: D- / 1/2 out of 4
Light It Up
(Dir: Craig Bolotin, Starring Usher Raymond, Forest Whitaker, Robert Ri'chard, Rosario Dawson, Venessa L. Williams, Clifton Collins, Jr., Fredro Starr, Sara Gilbert, Judd Nelson, Vic Polizos, and Glynn Turman)
A powerful and uplifting film about six misunderstood inner-city students who close down their school in a desperate attempt to improve dismal classro...More at HotMovieSale.com
Light It Up is a gripping story about six misunderstood inner-city students trying to cope where there s little hope. In his dazzling leading-role deb...More at Buy.com
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