Notorious

Notorious-2009

Notorious is noteworthy for being a musical biopic to a modern day legend. Usually films of this style discuss a musician who has been around for years and has shown over decades the impact and importance of the artists' music such as Taylor Hackford's Ray, James Mangold's Walk the Line or even Todd Haynes' 2007 ensemble masterpiece I'm Not There. What is so unique about Notorious is that it is about a musician who is considered legendary and genre-defending after releasing only one album before his death, showing the utter importance of B.I.G. to hip-hop

Notorious follows Christopher Wallace from the streets of Brooklyn to the world-wide phenomenon that would become known as The Notorious B.I.G. We first see Wallace as a child, played be the late rapper's son, being told he is "too fat, too black and too ugly" to be as successful as the musicians he hopes to be like that he glamourizes in hip-hop magazines. As he grows older, played by newcomer Jamal Woolard, he beings to sell crack to live the lifestyle he has always dreamed of. While hustling, he shows a profound ability to create incredible rhymes, making his friends insist that he leave the lifestyle that is destined to send him to jail once again. With a new goal for his life, he meets with up-and-coming producer Sean "Puff Daddy" Combs, portrayed by Friday Night Lights' Derek Luke, and leads to his legendary success, friendship and betrayal with Tupac Shakur and ultimately, his untimely death.

The infamous rivalry between Tupac and Biggie has been well documented and does not take up the majority of the film. Therefore, director George Tillman Jr. focuses of Wallace's rising to fame. We see the relationships and people who make him who he is. The women in his life, Lil' Kin and wife Faith Evans played by Naturi Naughton and Antonique Smith, respectively, and the most important woman to him, his mother, as shown by Angela Bassett, and the friendships with Combs and others that help him rise to the top.

B.I.G. never made any attempt to hide his love for his mother and Tillman's film proves at its best when Woolard and Bassett play opposite of each other, recreating this strong bond. Woolard already looks like Wallace, yet he studied several months at Juilliard to get his sound down perfectly and he sells every line. Bassett looks like what a younger version of Miss Wallace would like like and Bassett shows equal parts compassion and tough love for her son. trying to set him down the right path, no matter how far he strays.

While it is a welcome change to see a piece of media solely about The Notorious B.I.G., the film could have easily shown more of the relationship between Shakur and himself. With the exception of a few party scenes and random encounters, it is never truly acknowledged just how close the two were. Also, while the entire East Coast-West Coast rap rivalry does factor into that, more could have been showed of the importance of this in hip-hop music history.

But of course with Notorious, the greatest aspect will of course be the music. Every song is used in context and gives deeper meaning to the lyrics. We see a musical prodigy creating art in a way that few had before himself. We see the cogs of hip-hop turning and changing into something that it had never been before and an artist who changed everything. Notorious

shows what B.I.G. did to rap and makes current hip-hop chart-toppers look like jokes. Notorious fantastically illustrates that while Wallace's career was short, he was nonetheless revolutionary and that his music and legend still truly do have a life after death.

Rating: B-

Photo from RottenTomatoes