To Live and Die in L.A.

This is another one of my rare movie reviews. As I’ve said before, I don’t really know how to do reviewing in a stylistically meaningful way, so I’ll just stick with basic information.

For starters, this movie is 25 years old, so you need to understand that it is a product of the 1980s.

Acting: B+. Good effort by serious stars.

Directing: OK. I guess this gets a C.

Plot: C. Average, shopworn plot. Cop breaks the law to avenge fallen partner. Lots of moral ambiguity.

Action: B-. Entertaining gun fights and physical combat, but the car chase scene falls way short of French Connection quality.

Tits and Ass: C+. Both present, slightly above average quality and quantity. It probably was better than a C+ in the 1980s, but hey, we’ve gotten jaded since then.

Cinematography: A++. This is the strong point of this movie. It’s pretty. It has a period piece Miami Vice vibe with extra grit, appropriate for LA.

Overall, this is worth putting on your Netflix queue if you have not already seen it.

Here’s a vintage song by 2Pac that has nothing to do with the movie, other than the name. I don’t like much rap, but this is good.

2Pac is making a key point about LA’s cultural importance, but you have to listen for it.  It begins and ends the song in an easily ignored background refrain, which the video images emphasize, where he says this:

West side . . .

I don’t doubt that he is right about this.  These days, Hollywood is less important than Compton.