This is the title of a film that was released in 1993. You may not have heard of it, don't worry, I am not sure many peopl have. It is a 3 hour long epic of gang life in east L.A. set from the early 1970's to the late 1980's. It follows 3 cousins who grow up together and end up taking very different paths. You may wonder why I am telling you this. It has to do with lesson 489 of being a teacher. Never say yes to a student without knowing for sure what you are getting into. One of my students asked me if I had seen this movie and I said no, I had never heard of it. He raved about it and said I had to see it, it was great, his favorite movie. I figured this was the end. But no, he brought the DVD to school. The unrated directors cut. Fantastic.
This movie had some very bad acting, some very bad violence (but no worse than the Sopranos), and I was sure it was never going to end. There was one surprise at which I was mildly interested and Sarah (who watched in protest at first and then in the way that you can't stop watching something horrific because you might miss the most horrific part) wants me to bring it up at parent teacher conferences this week as to why they let their son watch this movie and if they want him to emmulate the behavior. The movie was pretty true to real life. Much of it takes place in San Quentin and I have seen several documentaries on it and it did not seem overly dramatic for the movie.
Anyway, my review is thumbs down because frankly it is depressing, especially if you have never been to L.A. and never spent much time with hispanic people, it only shows the negative side of gang life (no there is not a positive). It is late, I am going to sleep.
1 comment:
I'm liking the new look of the blog. That's a fancy t-shirt too. :-) Sus
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