Boyz n the Hood (1991)
★★★★ — Boyz n the Hood (1991)
John Singleton was just twenty-three years old when he wrote and directed Boyz n the Hood, making him the youngest person ever nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director (and the first Black filmmaker to receive that nomination). Shot on location in South Central Los Angeles on a modest $6.5 million budget, the film arrived in 1991 at a moment of acute tension in the city, roughly eighteen months before the Rodney King riots, and its portrait of systemic neglect and street violence felt uncomfortably current to many viewers. Columbia Pictures took a modest risk on an almost entirely untested director, and the film returned nearly nine times its budget at the box office. For Ice Cube, recently departed from N.W.A, it was a significant acting debut, while Laurence Fishburne and a young Cuba Gooding Jr. rounded out a cast that gave the project real dramatic weight.
80s n 90s california is such a good setting. For John Singleton's relative inexperience he crafts one of the best films of it's era and it's genre. It's thought provoking, raw, well acted and with a great soundtrack. It's a little obvious in terms of ending and honestly I feel like Menace 2 Society is just stronger in all areas. If you like this you'll love Snowfall, which John Singleton also made.
Rating: ★★★★ | Year: 1991 | Watched: 2025-05-10
Where to watch (UK)
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Related on Movies With Macca
More from John Singleton: 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003)
More from the 1990s: Lessons of Darkness (1992) · Shinjuku Boys (1995) · Blue (1993) · Cemetery Man (1994)
More crime: A Better Tomorrow (1986) · Angst (1983) · Stolen Face (1952) · Cairo Station (1958)
More drama: Viy (1967) · Wonder (2017) · A Better Tomorrow (1986) · Beautiful Boy (2018)
