Popular reviews

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  Review by Blake Bergman "Various Spaghetti" ★★★

  "Rappin'" is a 1985 film directed by Joel Silberg and is a production of the infamous Cannon. This film runs alongside other similar efforts such as "Breakin'" (1984) and "Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo" (1984) in energy and is actually somewhat considered the third installment in the series even though none of the narrative is connected whatsoever. The narrative features a Rappin' John Hood as he gets out of prison and returns to his rundown neighborhood section of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Without really telling the extent of time gone, it seems that time spent was brief but long enough for the local dynamic to change, with part of his gang branching off as rivals, including his former girl. Additionally, there is a…

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  Review by AbandonChimp ★★

  In which a group of wayward teens manage to convince the zoning board to save their neighborhood THROUGH THE POWER OF RAP MUSIC.

  Makes me nostalgic for the cinematic masterworks of the Fat Boys.

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  Review by SpaghettiNoir ★★ 3

  Mid-'80s Cannon Films cash in on the emerging hip-hop scene, joining the ranks of Krush Groove and Disorderlies, except these filmmakers cast folks like Melvin van Peebles and Eric La Salle instead of real MCs. Much of the rapping & singing is luckily left to some talented little kids, and when Ice T stops by for a brief performance halfway through, it feels like a rousing plot twist. Generally terrible but goes down easy thanks to that '80s/Golan & Globus sheen that makes me feel like I'm discovering this shit post-Saturday morning cartoons.

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  Review by VIVE_le_FILTH ★★★ 2

  Kayne West can only dream about writing rap songs as good as the ones in this film!

  Another Cannon Films classic

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  Review by MrSneakyMan ★★★ 6

  This is one of those movies from the mid 80s that granted dorky white people the permission to be all "Yo, my name is Trevor and I'm here to say; I love this rapping in a major way. Zip zap, rip to the rap, a rip rip rippity-rap y'all!" while they are doing the worm. Breakin', Body Rock, Beat Street. They are all in that category, but this is by far the worst offender on that front.

  Mario Van Peebles plays John "Rappin'" Hood. A former street tough just out of prison. And boy does he love his rap. It's kinda all he does. Just sort of dancing and 'freestyle' rapping about everything he sees and hears. And he's is…

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  Review by DrewMcWeeny 2

  You have no idea how bad Mario Van Peebles is at rapping, but thank god they made an entire film to throw a spotlight on it.

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  Review by Sally Jane Black 2

  A rap musical probably seemed like a revolutionary idea in 1985, and this gentle, earnest attempt at it lacks the bite and edge one might expect a decade later, or the genre-bending production we get nowadays. It serves the film well--it's charming family-friendly fare with the quintessential underdog-under-capitalism story, which is to say, the evil developer breaking up a Community. (There's a reason that story persists.) It veers into absolute cheez, especially during the finale when every ethnic stereotype in the film gets a couplet, but like a good musical, it also refuses to adhere to any rules of reality, instead letting a musical spectacle save the day--inadvertently (?) acknowledging the idea of rap (or any other form of music) as a Voice of the People kind of thing. Blended with the Robin Hood references, the film at the very least engages with the spirit of something real. It's fluff, it's flawed. It's ridiculous.

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  Review by Joe ★★★ 1

  Mostly had to watch this through my fingers because I was so embarrassed for everyone involved, but it was a good, healthy, purifying kind of embarrassment, the kind The Establishment doesn't want you to Feel. Highlights:

  - Mario Van Peebles getting to break out that Jaws IV Jamaican accent in order to evade suspicion by the police (??).

  - Ice-T and David Storrs' "Killer," a surprisingly dark look at police brutality and gun violence dropped into the middle of this mostly happy-go-lucky rap musical, seemingly unnoticed by any of the filmmakers or characters within the story.

  - "Snack Attack," a song about eating lots of food.

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  Review by Justin LaLiberty ★★★

  wild how this is legit the same movie as Breakin' 2 only instead of being about breakin' it's, naturally, about rappin' -- in any case, the more movies about the community taking on greedy real estate developers and winning, the better (I see you, Step Up 4)

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  Review by laird

  The Five Noble Truths of Buddhism:

  The Truth of Dukkha is that all conditional phenomena and experiences are not ultimately satisfying;

  The Truth of the Origin of Dukkha is that craving for and clinging to what is pleasurable and aversion to what is not pleasurable result in becoming, rebirth, dissatisfaction, and redeath;

  The Truth of the Cessation of Dukkha is that putting an end to this craving and clinging also means that rebirth, dissatisfaction, and redeath can no longer arise;

  The Truth of the Path Of Liberation from Dukkha is that by following the Noble Eightfold Path—namely, behaving decently, cultivating discipline, and practicing mindfulness and meditation—an end can be put to craving, to clinging, to becoming, to rebirth, to dissatisfaction, and to redeath.

  The Truth of the Snack Attack is that funky junk food just makes me chunky.

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  Review by Carlo V 3

  Easily one of the worst movies I've ever seen. Cannon Films tries to emulate the magic of Krush Groove & Beat Street but forgets to hire a director who understands hip hop culture. Case in point: Mario Van Peebles stars as John "Rappin" Hood (get it?), a guy whose rap skills are that of a pre-schooler, but somehow has to fight off record producers. There's also the part where they try to do their own version of The Fat Boys' "All You Can Eat" from Krush Groove called "Snack Attack," except it's 100% awful because y'know, instead of the Fat Boys you've just got some random fat guy and Eriq LaSalle doing his best Kurtis Blow voice. And then just to…

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  Review by Lorenzo ★★

  "Green is the color, the color of cash, the color of a rasta stash, the color of grass, the color of trees, the color of boogers when you sneeze..."

  If you are going to call your film Rappin', it would have been a good idea to hire people who can at least do that decently. I like Mario Van Peebles but he's no rapper. There's some qualified artists that do appear like Ice-T and Master Gee of the Sugarhill Gang but is not enough to save this train wreck.

  Memorable for all the wrong reasons. Definitely not as fun as the Breakin' films.