Superfly (2018): Review by @Kush_Hayes
When I first heard about this reboot, I had two thoughts:
“The new Priests hair is fantastic”, and
“Fuck that fucking movie.”
Im happy to say I have a change of heart on one of those thoughts.
Hair still fantastic, but this movie is quite entertaining.
Why the biased going in? Personally, I don’t see the glamour in pimps and I hate cocaine therefore not a fan of the users or pushers.
But lets put that aside, Priest is not a pimp in this outside of the side slang term for a guy who is really really good with women, and he has two on his side that are very loyal. But he does not exploit women the other way.
The cocaine? Well, the movie is the movie, there’s an objective and a plan and despite this being a remake/reboot, there is a sense of danger, there are consequences for mistakes unlike Oceans 8.
By the way, “Priest” is our main characters name, not Superfly, as many people mistake. “Superfly” is an adjective. Its a style. Its a way of life and its a philosophy.
Speaking of Priest, hes been hustling as long as he can remember, started at the bottom and was recruited by another gangster named scatter who took him under his wing. Scatter teaches him how to fight, dress, hustle harder, etc etc.
We see Priests normal routine, shaking down hip hop tough guys, romancing his girls at the club and handling himself again 5 thugs in a classic Joel Silver fight scene. Ultimately an innocent girl gets shot and of course everyone disperses.
Joel Silvers fingers are all over the fun parts of this movie. The action scenes, the car chases are all some of the better parts of this movie.
Director X who, no joke intended, I don’t know, but I do know he takes Alex Tses screenplay adapted from the 1972 Philip Fenty screenplay, and just polishes the hell out of this movie. Everything is really slick and stylized and it looks great. It also adds 20 minutes to this movie that I think would make the movie more enjoyable if it were just shorter.
Once we get to the plan to “get out for good” I do have to question, eh, why not get out right now? $33 million dollars can last a long time in Montenegro as it is. But fine, ok, Priest needs a whole lot of goddamn palmade, so once we’re on the final plan, its running smooth. And then of course its not running smooth. People within Priests organization keep going over his head, but probably because they saw him going over Scatters head and its just a cycle that repeats itself in this movie, in all the crews.
People go over Priests head. JuJu goes over Qs head, Adalberto Gonzalez sent his own brother to jail because momma liked him better… these all do end up being complications for Priest and his women to get out of Atlanta.
And then we meet some corrupt cops too…
Trevor Jackson playing Priest is definitely the standout in this movie. Jason Mitchell from Straight Outta Compton plays a great lieutenant. Big Bank Black who plays Q is a solid domestic gangster comparing him to Gonzalez played by Esai Morales who’s good in everything and makes you wish he was in more stuff. There is a time when I am looking at 3 guys on screen and cant tell which on is Rick Ross who plays a character named Stacks.
This hyper version of the 1972 cult classic has a threesome in the shower, lots of guns, cartooney villains, great fight scenes, lots of cuss words including those nasty eN-bombs, as well as great car chases throughout Atlanta, guys treating women like shit and of course 2 of the 3 staple songs from the original movie. By the way, the things that sound positive there, are positive, and obviously the negative make you not feel bad when that character ultimately does not do a celebration dance at the end.
Im happy to give this movie four out of six blueberries.
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