cause this movie right here...

>In the course of his
>conversation with X, the screenwriter revealed a compelling
>story of his own — that of a college graduate who had overcome
>hardships of all kinds to get an education and eventually
>break into the business.

...would make about twelve dollars at the box office.

as for her beef with hustle and flow, what's really harmful to black films is people like her who demand that every black character in every movie is a fair representation of all black people. if every black movie that opens is greeted with a crowd of black folks complaining that the characters are too poor or too rich or too violent or too sanitized, eventually hollywood is gonna stop making black films, or at least stop making challenging ones.

the truth is, A LOT of black people suffer a similar standard of living to the characters in hustle and flow... too many. so is it really that despicable to tell their story in a measured and thoughtful film, or would she rather we ignore them completely and hope some hurricane takes care of that problem for us?

personally, i was surprised at how exploitative hustle and flow WASN'T. nothing about djay's lifestyle was glorified-- even he hated what he saw in the mirror-- except his passion for pursuing his dream, a passion that spread to every other character in the movie. i'll say it again, the DREAM and the PASSION is what's glorified in hustle and flow, not the lifestyle. yeah, the dream happened to be rapper, but in reality for MANY poor black folks, rapper is one of maybe four attractive options they see themselves presented with.

i thought hustle and flow was one of the best films of 2005, black or otherwise, and it's a real shame that so many people's kneejerk reaction to any film with poor black folks in it is to cry exploitation. it's just a way to avoid facing the issues head-on. it'd be just like someone saying that all those poor black folks on TV in the aftermath of katrina were a product of exploitation by the white media, as opposed to facing reality and saying, "holy shit, there's a LOT of poor black folks in america. maybe we should do something about it."