Boyz n the Hood (1991)

Follows the lives of three young males living in the Crenshaw ghetto of Los Angeles, dissecting questions of race, relationships, violence, and future prospects.

Director:

John Singleton

Writer:

John Singleton

Stars:

Cuba Gooding Jr., Laurence Fishburne, Hudhail Al-Amir

Nominated for 2 Oscars. Another 12 wins & 21 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Hudhail Al-Amir	...	S.A.T. Man
Lloyd Avery II	...	Knucklehead #2
Angela Bassett	...	Reva Styles
Miya McGhee	...	Female Club Member (as Mia Bell)
Lexie Bigham	...	Mad Dog
Kenneth A. Brown	...	Little Chris
Nicole Brown	...	Brandi - Age 10
Ceal	...	Sheryl
Morris Chestnut	...	Ricky Baker
Darneicea Corley	...	Keisha
John Cothran	...	Lewis Crump (as John Cothran Jr.)
Ice Cube	...	Doughboy
Na'Blonka Durden	...	Trina (as Na' Blonka Durden)
Susan Falcon	...	Mrs. Olaf
Jessie Lawrence Ferguson	...	Officer Coffey (as Jesse Ferguson)

Storyline

Writer and Director John Singleton's portrayal of social problems in inner-city Los Angeles, California takes the form of a tale of three friends growing up together in the "hood". Half-brothers Doughboy (Ice Cube) and Ricky Baker (Morris Chestnut) are foils for each other's personality, presenting very different approaches to the tough lives they face. Ricky is the "All-American" athlete, looking to win a football scholarship to USC and seeks salvation through sports, while Doughboy succumbs to the violence, alcohol, and crime surrounding him in his environment, but maintains a strong sense of pride and code of honor. Between these two is their friend Tre Styles (Cuba Gooding, Jr.), who is lucky to have a father, Furious Styles (Laurence Fishburne), to teach him to have the strength of character to do what is right and to always take responsibility for his actions.

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Plot Keywords:

gangsta | walking on train tracks | dead body | african american protagonist | violence | 

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Taglines:

Increase the peace.

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Genres:

Crime | Drama

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Certificate:

14A

Did You Know?

Trivia

The role of Doughboy was specifically written for Ice Cube, who John Singleton met while working as an intern at The Arsenio Hall Show (1989). Singleton claims that the other two leads, Cuba Gooding Jr. and Morris Chestnut, were cast simply because they were the first ones who showed up at the casting auditions.

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Goofs

The California license plate on Furious Styles' VW Beetle in the 1984 scenes was not available until 1987.

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Quotes

Doughboy: Yeah, I heard you been gettin' that dope-head pussy. See, me, I probably get more pussy than you get air with yo' wannabe macdaddy ass.
Dooky: You don't know what I be getting. I don't be fucking no dopeheads. I let them suck my dick. Shit, they got AIDS and shit.
Monster: Stupid motherfucker, don't you know you can catch that shit from letting them suck on your dick?
Doughboy: Thank you.
Dooky: See. I ain't sick. I ain't all skinny and shit.
Chris: Nigga, what you mean you ain't skinny. Motherfucker so skinny, he can hula hoop through a ...
[...]

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Crazy Credits

Dialogue starts as soon as the Columbia Pictures logo appears on the screen and continues through the brief opening credits.

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Alternate Versions

The Criterion Collection laserdisc features two scenes deleted from the theatrical version. They are as follows: Tre and his mother have a telephone conversation about his future with Brandi and college. Doughboy has a confrontation with Furious after Ricky gets shot.

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Connections

Referenced in The Force Is with Them: The Legacy of 'Star Wars' (2004)

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Soundtracks

More Bounce to the Ounce
Written by Roger Troutman
Performed by Zapp
Courtesy of Warner Bros. Records Inc.
By Arrangement with Warner Special Products

User Reviews

Hard, thoughtful film with messages for everybody

John Singleton's Boyz n the Hood remains one of the best fictionalized and most poignant summaries of some of America's toughest internal problems - racism, violence, poverty, and drug abuse. This is not a hip-hop film, nor a detached and dehumanized story about "gang violence" (the great over-simplified scapegoat of the issues treated in this film), its a story about growing up fatherless or motherless in a war zone with a faceless enemy, where people do not value each other's lives at all and value their own lives only slightly more.

Laurence Fishburn leads one of the best casts of the early 1990s, in his memorable portrayal of Furious Styles, a father trying to raise his son (Cuba Gooding Jr) well in an environment where murder and substance abuse are day-to-day realities - South Central L.A. The film follows his son, Tre, and his friends, from the hardships of childhood in an irrelevant educational system and a neighborhood which doesn't allow kids to be kids, through to the realities of making decisions about the value of life and the development of responsibility and hope as young adults.

The cast disappears into their characters and brings each one to life in a unique and powerful way. losing the identities of big personalities like Fishburne and Ice Cube is no mean feat. Many of the performances recorded here are award-worthy - Fishburne, Bassett, Chesnutt, Gooding, and Ice Cube are especially memorable. For me personally, this is the film that convinced me that Ice Cube was destined to become a major personality in American cinema. While I had enjoyed some of his music prior to this film, it was here that I was first exposed to his versatility and intelligence as an actor.

While some may see some of the film's messages as heavy-handed, and others might have issues with the fact that the film deals with so many of the problems of inner-city life in a very 'in-your-face' almost archetypal manner, I find these criticisms impossible to justify.

This is a great film about real issues, sensitively portrayed and thoughtfully examined. Every American who cares about the vast untapped potential of our people ought to take a long, hard look at this one. These are not 'black problems', they are everybody's problems, and their solutions will require everybody's understanding. I could think of far worse places to begin developing that understanding than Boyz n the Hood.

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

12 July 1991 (USA)

Also Known As:

La loi de la rue

Filming Locations:

5918 Cimarron Street, Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$6,500,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$10,023,462, 14 July 1991

Gross USA:

$57,504,069

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$57,529,070

Company Credits

Production Co:

Columbia Pictures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

112 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Stereo Dolby Atmos Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1