Quick Review: Juice

There’s a scene early on in Juice that tells you all you need to know about the character of Bishop, played by Tupac Shakur.  It’s a quick blink and you’ll miss it moment, and it’s easy to overlook because it’s when we are meeting the four main characters one right after another.  At the start of his day before heading out with his crew, Bishop takes a moment with his father, who stares blankly at the tv ahead of him.  He never acknowledges his son, but Bishop still tucks some cash into his shirt pocket anyway.  It’s perhaps the only scene in the whole film where Bishop shows care towards anyone else.  Not much longer into the movie and Bishop is accosted by the film’s bully Radames who makes a wisecrack about what might have happened to Bishop’s father in prison.  It’s not a kind suggestion and despite being outnumbered, it triggers Bishop into attacking anyone within reach.  Were it not for the intervention of his friend Raheem, he’d have likely gotten his ass kicked.

It’s important to show this chip that weighs heavy on Bishop’s shoulder to understand why this film takes him to the places that it does.  First time director Ernest Dickerson (who’d previously been Spike Lee’s director of photography) shows us a few days in the lives of young men who don’t have much of a future.  They spend their days loitering around Samuel L Jackson’s arcade hustling for money and their nights attempting to hustle girls.  Raheem (Khalil Khan), the leader of the group is charming but has problems of his own.  He’s got a young son and his on-again-off-again relationship with the mother is anything but healthy.  Q (Omar Epps) is a very talented mix-master and has hopes of winning a local contest held by Queen Latifa, but is burdened by the fact that he is unknown and local.  Rounding out the quartet is Steel (Jermaine Hopkins), a young man whose nickname is ironic at best, as most of his time is spent being the group jester.

After a chance meeting with a former friend Blizz, who soon after dies attempting to rob a bar the day he got out of prison, the young boys decide to take a play from his book and stick up a local bodega owner.  Everything goes smoothly until Bishop decides that the man was making a move and murders him.  What was once a tight crew quickly splinters as Bishop slides further into his rage and decides it is he who holds all the “juice” and everyone best fall in line with him.  Those that don’t meet the wrong end of a bullet.  That young man who was so tender with his father early in the movie has realized that he “aint shit and aint ever gonna be shit” so he’s going to live the life and if he dies, he dies.  He’s not going to end up like his father. 

That leaves it up to a conflicted Q to stop him.

Juice is a high energy film, matching what it feels like to be young and alive, filled with fantastic music and solid performances.  Both Epps and Shakur stand out, particularly Shakur, who manages to go from boyishly charming to conniving and menacing with ease.  It’s a character that could’ve easily become a cartoonish villain but with him you hold out hope until the very end that he could turn it around, but the pit in your stomach tells you that he won’t. 

Rated 4 out of 5 stars.