Roxanne Roxanne has me a bit conflicted. Bad film? No way. Too short? Most definitely.
Roxanne Roxanne, produced by director Michael Larnell, is placed in 1980s Queensbridge Projects, as our main subject, Shante (Chante Adams) based on the mother of rap herself, Roxanne Shante, finds she’s conflicted between hitting the textbooks or mastering the rap game. At the height of the Roxanne Wars, hip-hop rivalries between Roxanne Shante and The Real Roxanne, produced a multitude of new music, mostly remixes derived from Untouchable Force Organization (UTFO) hit single, “Roxanne, Roxanne”. The song has become a hip-hop classic.
In the context of the movie, and at only 14 years of age, Shante is known on the block as one of the best. An undisputed master of the art form. And everyone knows it. The film is a depiction of Roxanne Shante’s coming-of-age between pubescence and young motherhood.
Her family situation isn’t so stellar, with a father lasting but a vestige of screen-time before departing for the rest of the film, and a mother (Nia Long) that turns to alcohol to relieve herself of very recent economic downturn. It’s certainly heart-wrenching, but the turn-around is fairly quick, as Shante keeps hope alive through rap and hip-hop, which she eventually books into a full-time job akin to her real-life self. But the arrogance, given her age, is strong. And it leads Shante to many not-so-pleasant places.
Cast-wise, Roxanne Roxanne is rife with talent: with Kathrine Narducci, Kevin Phillips, Eden Smith, and Adam Horovitz, among many others. The main cast is regulated to Shante’s sisters, her best friend Ranita (Shenell Edmonds) and eventual husband, who assumes the antagonist in the second half. These characters, although exceptional in their own right, mostly take back-seat to Shante herself, and feel more like caricatures of assumed personality traits meant to lead Shante to her next field-goal.
The later half of the movie introduces Shante’s child, her reluctance to continue producing records, and the marital abuse conducted by her husband (Mahershala Ali), a decade’s older individual with an affinity for street drugs. The recreation of Roxanne Shante’s rise to fame certainly leaves an impression, and it’s flaws are sparse, but the film is well-worth the time to watch, digest, and celebrate as a near-historical documentary on the chronicles of modern music.
