Babies Gotta Eat, I Suppose

October 12 will mark the ten year anniversary of Mos Def's magnum opus "Black On Both Sides". The critically-acclaimed record was one of the last gasps in the "Golden Era of Hip-Hop" (though it technically was released after the widely accepted 1988-1998 time frame), released the same year as The Roots' "Things Fall Apart" and Rawkus Records' Soundbombing II compilation (both which featured Mos).

Back in 1999, Young Toldja was rolling around doing very pathetic notebook graffiti with a Magnum 44that should have belonged to someone who knew what she was doing and bumping homemade mixtapes in my Walkman. Mos Def's music gave me a lot to think about and a lot of (false) hope for the future of Hip-Hop. Coming only a year behind Black Star's debut album, BOBS was quickly one of my favorite records and I had great hopes for Mos's career as an emcee. In the years to follow, he never matched the quality (in my opinion) of that record, but he showed great skill as an actor on both stage (Topdog/Underdog) and screen (HBO's "Something The Lord Has Made" and "Lackawanna Blues" most notably). Despite some disagreement with some of the things he has said publicly and some choices in his personal life, Mos has been one of my favorite artist-activists for quite some time now.

So, imagine my surprise when I saw this:


HONORING THE TEN-YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF A CLASSIC ALBUM: YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG.

What in the hackneyed buddy comedy, ethnic stereotype hell is this? Mike Epps notwithstanding, there are some pretty talented actors here. I know it's a recession, but I don't expect the person who made "Brown Skin Lady" to be in a flick like this. And in one of the rare times post-Clueless that Donald Faison is appearing on screen with a Black woman, he's calling them hookers. Goodness gracious, great balls of bullshit.

How many times have we seen this lame Black versus Brown scenario play out? In this corner, our goofy, shiftless, good for nothing Black protagonists. And in THIIIIIIS corner, our Latino gangbangers, who will inevitably say "Ese" and "homes" throughout the flick. And of course, we have our spicy Latina- who managed to say "Ay dios mio!" in the trailer!

Now, we all know the world would explode if the primary hot chick in a movie with a bunch of Black men is darker than a paper bag, even though we'd rather she'd just not be Black at all. However, for those of you who do want a little sister action, we have Lauren "Nu Nu" London, a Flavor Of Love reject and porn actress Lacey Duvalle rounding out the cast. Good times!

Bad Black movies do not surprise me. Black movies laden with stereotypes do not surprise me. Mos Def's love for non-Black women does not surprise me. But the Mighty Mos appearing in some grade-A hood' flick bullshit like this? After "Lackawanna Blues"? After "The Italian Job"? Yeah, that threw me for a bit of a loop. Shit, even corny-ass "Brown Sugar"* was better than this!

I'll just try my best to remember Dante the way he was:


Booooooo,
Sister Toldja

*-Anything with Taye Diggs is supect, sorry.