Monday, August 18, 2008

AMERICAN PIMP















(1999) Director:
Albert Hughes, Allen Hughes

DVD
NETFLIX

SUMMARY:

Albert and Allen Hughes, the writing and directing team of Menace II Society and Dead Presidents, turn their documentary eye to the world of street pimps in this 1999 Sundance Film Festival Documentary Competition entry. The black urban pimps interviewed here open up to reveal their world and their secrets to the camera in a film that is not about sex, but about power. We meet pimps named Filmore Slim, C-Note, K-Red, Gorgeous Dre, and Rosebudd as they discuss their business, including percentages, lifestyles, stealing "ho's," and the Player's Ball. These men exude charm and charisma, and boast rock-star status in their communities, with expensive clothes, cars, and bankrolls. The film works as an allegory to the film and music industries, where people are lured with glamor and money, only to be used as commodity and tossed out once they have passed their prime. The film also traces the history of the street pimp from the '20s to the present, with particular emphasis on the '70s pimp, whose lifestyle was exposed in the blaxploitation films of the '70s. - Chris Gore, All Movie Guide

VIDEO: FULL FEATURE



REVIEWS, INTERVIEWS, CREDITS:

"A brilliant, alarmingly honest portrait" - Vanity Fair
"Outrageously entertaining" - Entertainment Weekly
"Essential viewing" - Hollywood Reporter
Rotten Tomatoes reviews
Albert & Allen Hughes interviewed by Gerald Perry about AMERICAN PIMP
Other Hughes brothers films include Menace II Society, Dead Presidents, and From Hell

NOTES:
Voicemail from The Bishop Don Magic Juan
The AMERICAN PIMP Drinking Game
Quotes from AMERICAN PIMP
"Gorgeous Dre" (From Pimp to Life Coach)

0 comments: