TROUBL

1. She-Rell

   Wow…i never could see why folks idolized this movie so….

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2. Erika

   Me either!!!!

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3. TROUBLMan

   We love the bad guy because we’re not humble achieve success the right way. “Niggas” care more about rims than they do about degrees. Everybody wants to be “The Man” and no one wants to be “A Man.”

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4. Malia

   Thugs are thugs and are for whatever reason “entertaining” on a pop cultural level in the US!!!! Stupid, I know…..

   The glamourization of the thug is only one of the contributing factors to an even bigger problem: people see crime as a way to get quick money and since they face the burdens of street life, those people often don’t have the resources, willingness, or patience to go legit!!! There are no doctors, teachers, lawyers, or other professional people in those neighborhoods to look up to. We are always talking about keeping it real but if we really want to “keep it real”, we should discuss proactive solutions and advocate legitimate ways to improve the quality of life like seeking higher education and improving our communities from within!!!

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5. ndira

   Its the rags to riches story. they dont consider the destruction that cocaine has caused to so many people. the look at the “success”, Respect materialism and the fact that he went out like a G. No fear.

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6. TROUBLMan

   MALIA

   The dudes who glamorize this shit aren’t thugs there goons. Politicians are thugs. They’re the ones who control the trade at the highest level. Tony and dudes like him are goons. They’re hired help, selling poison back to their brothers.

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7. Terry

   I agree with this piece up until the conclusion. I’m not sure that I can definitively say that it was a tool designed for the specific purpose of breeding generations of people who are willing to lead short, self-destructive lives for a bits of respect and money. While Scarface has definitely been the catalyst that’s inspired endless references and homages in mainstream pop culutre, that speaks to its quality as a film. There are even more ripoffs that are just trying to a cash in. “Im like Scarface…” (Stop it, your not! Pick a new simile dammit!) Scarface is one of the best kingpin stories around. Its also art. Without getting into the art imitating life or vice versa debate, what I find disheartening is the learned helplessness of the sheep who spit out the philosophies of Tony Montana as if they are words of wisdom. The effects that Scarface has on a small but heavily publicized portion of black and hispanic communities is distinct. The movie is on multiple all time top 100 lists and its loved by all walks. Yet, for some reason minorities are the target? I don’t buy it.

   I think this speaks to Q’s recent Anatomy of a Gangster piece “From the Block to the Boardroom.” Check it out if you haven’t already. Rather than target the art form as the culprit, it is a small piece to a bigger puzzle. We need to stop making excuses for people who need to take responsibility for the actions of themselves and their children. The joke is on people who take this fiction for real life. (Regardless of what inspired the film, which in this case is a remake of an other film of the same name, its presentation, acting and story telling are pure fiction over the 3 hours.) It’s entertainment and designed to be entertaining. A critique against the movie for the victims that it has created is actually just a critique about the knuckleheads who try to live it and fail. Why the shocked look that there are consequences? “Scarface” made me do it falls on deaf ears when you fuck up.

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8. Q.

   ahh, i’m feeling TROUBL this week.. y’all are on your game this week, and i applaud you for it..

   let me first say that i love Scarface.. i never looked at the movie as being something that would inspire me to be a part of the drug game.. i looked at it as the rags to riches that NDIRA spoke to.. i also loved his gangsta.. with one of the storylines being about being careful what you wish for, and watch out for those crabs.. i liked how he was even able to have that last powerful scene.. against all odds.. but digging deeper, looking at how he put his face into the drug that made him a beast.. what changed him.. what gave him that powdered courage.. that was what brought him down, and i felt that it could be a point that was often overlooked..

   but at the end of the day, it was entertainment that inspired movies and rappers.. that last scene inspired the scene in Belly.. that eventually, with this game, the world was going to go against you, and you was going to die for enjoying the fruits of that labor..

   i’m with Terry, and i don’t believe it was created to mess us all up.. even if it was, i would hope we would have people we can look up to in order to steer us in a different direction..

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9. Troublsome

   The white powder is not what anyone ever glamorizes. It’s the lifestyle. It’s the American Dream, come from nothing to something lifestyle that is seen. No one ever looks at the aftermath, or the people who are the demise to this white powder or any drug that is used as the tool to make money. Most people that glorify these people just see the material things are acquired from these drugs. Don’t get me wrong “I know not everyone can wear a suit and tie everyday and go get it” In some cases selling dope may be your niche. But I agree with Terry about Q’s Anatomy of a Gangster (From the Block to The Boardroom) I think if you can make it in the streets, you can transfer that energy to corporate America or the Work force and make a drastic impact as well.

   Emulating these Gangsters on the silver screen is all good and everything, but make your own identity. Create your own gangster to the world. Oh and one more thing ” Make a name for yourself” I’m tired of running into dudes on the streets and they say their names are “Gotti” “Bugsy” “Capone” even “Scarface” Create your own legacy, and allow people to emulate you… Besides I don’t think those Kats would be too happy with niggas carrying own their names…

   Besides there are some new Gangsters in town: Troublman, Q, Terry, Malia, Boosy, RBT, Mr. 39 Ways of Troubl, Always Write, SB, Troublsome and the entire Troubl Fam….

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10. RB3

    When the first people found “tools” for their society they were not already in the form of a hammer and a saw - a rock that fell from the mountain. Once part of this great whole, it fell to the earth for those who grasp it to use it. It became a tool at the hands of those who could wield it. Here are some excerpts from a book, concerning this tool, I think you all will find most interesting:

    “…crime was (re)presented in films through a deranged individual who performed his deeds singlehandedly in urban slums. Based on the realities of the 20s and 30s, crime scenes in films such as Scarface(1932), Little Ceaser(1930), and THE PUBLIC ENEMY(1931) moved from ETHNIC GHETTOS to downtown commercial centers. This enabled the criminal to resemble more closely those in the rising business class rather than the DARK, ETHNIC FOREIGNERS of earlier depictions.
    - Gardaphe

    The gangster film is a genre like pornography and the horror film, held in contempt socially and intellectually not because it may corrupt and not because it is artistically inferior to other kinds of film but because it realizes out dreams, exposes our deepest psychic urges…The genre speaks to not merely our fascination/repulsion with aspects of our socioeconomic milieu that we prefer to shut our eyes to but also to our fascination/repulsion with the most haunting depths or ourselves.
    - Munby

    If there is a problem the society is worried about or a fantasy it is ready to support, odds are it can be located in the gangster.
    - Lott

    …It is not long after the waning of the blackface minstrel show in the late nineteenth century that the Italian replaced the African as a subject of imitation in popular culture…. The black mask offered a way to play with the collective fears of a degraded and threatening - and male - Other while at the same time MAINTAINING SOME SYMBOLIC CONTROL OVER THEM…. What appears to have been appropriated were certain kinds of masculinity. To put on the cultural forms of ‘blackness’ was to engage in a complex affair of manly mimicry. It is this mimicry of masculinity that is the greatest function of the gangster figure.
    - Lott & Gardaphe ”

    IT MAY NOT HAVE BEEN INTENDED TO BE A TOOL, BUT IT IS CERTAINLY DOING THE JOB OF ONE.

    p.s.
    Rags to riches!… I mean what about James Brown. Thats a muthafucka to idolize to make an icon out of. He could have idolized the original Scarface and yet he chose Louis Jordan. And he had fewer options back then….

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11. *SB*

    I cant lie I like the movie Scarface- for several reasons but alot of black and latino people have taken it to heart…yes they identify with the struggle of getting by when the odds are against them but its more than that…people want to get rich quick…like TM said…they dont want to sit in college for several years…going into debt…when in a third of that time they can have the escalade on rims that they desire so badly…theyll have the hot gold-digger on their arm…theyll have the bling-bling….

    My uncle has been in jail since I was nine for pushing the white-gurl….I seen him for the first time since he left at his son’s funeral when I was 20…he will not get out until im 25….his son was living a similar lifestlye and got popped…so at the funeral he admitted to the f’ed up situation he had put himself in and eventually led his son to be in too…he was trying to tell all the little boys that call themselves men because they got a gun at the funeral…that the shit isnt glamorous- its real and he was living proof! My dad told me when I was old enough to truly understand that when the movie Scarface came out -my uncle was really impacted by the movie- he said he watched it over and over- it was his favorite…my dad said he even admitted into wanting to be the real Tony Montana…and as much as my dad tried to convince him otherwise- he wouldnt listen… so my dad was like look at him now!

    We need to stop taking these Hollywood images to heart…its a freaking movie…

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12. "A Mom"

    It was a movie. As I see it. I saw it when it first came out. Their was nothing positive about it. Al Pacino is one of my favorite actors but he just didn’t do it for me. I thought his acting was terrible. Nevertheless the movie became a cult type flick. I know some men who really think this was one of the best and have past it done to their sons as so. It was just a movie for me.

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13. KP

    I agree with many pieces of what people are saying. It is ‘just’ a movie. I don’t agree with the articles’ conclusion, that this is a tool used to breed a generation of people who want nothing more then money and destruction. It was simply a sensationalized rendition of a lifestyle that probably existed in many countries. One thing is for sure, many people saw this movie and ‘inhaled the gangsta.’ Immediately hit the block harder, bought another gun, yada yada. What you do after watching the movie defines who you are, mature, grown man, or immature, gullable idiot. If you can cut the movie off, and understand that it’s just entertainment, you’ll enter your normal world entertained. If you cut it off and can’t separate real from hollywood, you basically just ate your gangsta cookies and are doing nothing more then what white folks would love for you to do, and live up to their stereotypes. Whether you hustle, or suit & tie it, no movie designed to entertain should be used as an excuse for human behavior. People are always accountable.

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SEE ALSO

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