Once in the Life (2000)

Director:

Laurence Fishburne

Writers:

Laurence Fishburne (play)
Laurence Fishburne (screenplay)

Genre:

Crime | Drama

Tagline:

You're either in, or you're gone.

Plot:

Once in the life (of drug dealing and organized crime), can anyone get out? During a brief jail stay...

Plot Keywords:

Half Brother | Cigarette Smoking | Mother Daughter Relationship | Rhyming Slang | Betrayal

Cast

Eamonn Walker	...	Tony
Gregory Hines	...	Ruffhouse
Michael Paul Chan	...	Buddha
Dominic Chianese Jr.	...	Freddie Nine Lives
Tiger Chen	...	Chino
Paul Calderon	...	Manny Rivera
Andres Titus	...	Hector (as Andres 'Dres' Titus)
Titus Welliver	...	Torch
Laurence Fishburne	...	20 / 20 Mike
Harsh Nayyar	...	Cab Driver
Sue Costello	...	Sgt. Kneeley
Nick Chinlund	...	Mike Murphy
Timothy W. White	...	Little Billy (as Tim White)
Wanda De Jesus	...	Jackie
Justin Pierre Edmund	...	Little Mikey

MPAA:

Rated R for pervasive languge, strong violence and some drug content.

Runtime:

107 min | Germany:104 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Germany:16 | UK:18 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

New York City, New York, USA

Company:

Cinema Gypsy Productions

Hoodlums and poetry, not your average crime tale

Once in the Life means that once a hoodlum, always a hoodlum, and nobody gets in or out of `The Life' for free. Neighborhood hoodlums in New York sell drugs and run scams because they can't make it in the legitimate world, maybe because they have a criminal record, or a drug habit, or because they're just lazy. This simple story with a couple of twists about mostly despicable characters manages to draw compassion out of the audience for its main players because of their loyalty and compassion for each other. The film is written, produced, and directed by Laurence Fishburne, who also stars as 20/20 Mike (all hoodlums have nicknames), and is based on his play, `Riff Raff.' It feels like a play from beginning to end, especially during the longest scene where the three main players square off to decide who can be trusted. Often times the dialog comes very fast, much faster than it would on stage, and I think it's the film's biggest flaw. Mixed in as flashbacks throughout the film are poems from the street, a sort of iambic pentameter rap, that is violent and evocative of the world this movie discloses. The poetry makes it difficult to dismiss these men, these hoodlums who murder, cheat, and betray each other, as unworthy of our attention or below our contempt. The disturbing thing about this film is that its realism shows us not only how these people live, but how they suffer for the same reasons as us all. One is too stupid, another a junkie, and the last suffers from conscience while the audience wonders, or even laughs, at the irony of executioners demanding from him hanging in the gallows to tell jokes in the midst of his demise.