Site Presented By
Wednesday, Nov 25, 2009
Makers of an ill-fated indie film about L.A. gangbangers claim that a fear of unruly black audiences has prompted theater owners to shun their work.
Nov 5, 2002 | Since filming of the movie "Gang Tapes" ended, four of its five stars have landed in trouble with the law, primarily for armed robbery. Another cast member couldn't make it to the premiere because he was in jail. Two more actors had friends and relatives who were murdered while the film was being made.
That may seem like an astonishing streak of bad luck for one movie; but given the circumstances of the casting and filming of "Gang Tapes," the outcome is sadly typical. Shot entirely on digital video, "Gang Tapes" is the story of a group of South Central Los Angeles gang members, one of whom videotapes their activities over the course of one summer. The camera bobs and weaves around the gang as they rape, rob and deal crack, leaving a wide swath of death and devastation in their wake. Directed by a Los Angeles Police Department reserve officer, the film featured a cast of mostly novice actors and local gang members who improvised action and dialogue using their own experience as a resource. What resulted is a disturbing depiction of inner-city gang life -- a fictional film that feels as real as a documentary.
"Gang Tapes" is so authentic, say its makers, that movie theaters are shying away from it, leaving what some perceive to be an invitation to violence unscreened by the general public. The film was funded by Lions Gate, a studio with a solid track record at the box office, and it's been endorsed by many in the black community -- garnering kudos from the likes of hip-hop maven Dr. Dre. But more than a decade after the rise of urban-themed breakout films like "Boyz N the Hood" and "Menace II Society" -- even as films like "Brown Sugar" and "Barbershop" perform soundly at the box office -- the threat of mayhem sparked by "Gang Tapes" and its gritty realism appears to have theater owners running the other way. It's been a year since the movie made its debut at film festivals, and it seems destined to be released straight to DVD.
"I can't help but feel that if my film was about Italian kids in the streets of New York, but otherwise the same exact film, this problem wouldn't exist," says "Gang Tapes" director Adam Ripp. "There is a certain amount of racism connected with black films."
Ray Price, the vice president of marketing at Landmark Theaters, acknowledges the stereotypes about black films and black audiences. But he suggests that the fiscal realities affecting most edgy low-budget films also come into play.
"There are a lot of preconceived notions still. It's better than it was, but for those people who are really trying to stretch and enlarge the scope of what [black films] can be, it's a very hard job" to get distribution.
"Gang Tapes" tells the story of Kris, a 14-year-old living with his mother and little sister in Watts. Kris has acquired a video camera from older neighborhood buddies who stole it during a carjacking, and he decides to document all the illicit activities he embarks on with his friends. What unfolds, from Kris' point of view, is the day-to-day life of a crew of Los Angeles gangbangers. The audience, through Kris' lens, sees drive-by shootings, backyard parties, makeshift crack labs and freestyle rap sessions as well as a brutally graphic armed robbery and rape. Eventually, as Kris' friends -- mostly jail-hardened older teenagers -- trigger a gang war with their rivals, the bodies start falling.
"I wanted to make the most realistic film ever made about South Central gang life," Ripp says. "Pull-no-punches raw reality. Brutal. A true depiction of gang members that humanizes them in a way, rather than stereotypes them."
To achieve this goal -- and partly, no doubt, because of a tight $500,000 budget -- Ripp cast his film with Watts locals: gang members, ex-gang members, and friends of gang members. Rather than script the film word for word, he gave his actors script guides and then let them make up their own dialogue. Thanks to the rapid-fire delivery of local slang by the film's actors, as well as the intentionally amateurish camerawork, "Gang Tapes" feels at moments more like a grimly violent documentary than a feature film. It can also be murky and hard to follow, leaving viewers in the dust, wishing for subtitles.
Ripp grew up in Hollywood but got many of his ideas for "Gang Tapes" on the job in Los Angeles: He signed up as a reserve police officer in the late 1990s to research a movie about beat cops and has worked part time as an officer ever since. His cast members were never informed of his other job, even as they gave him insights into the gang world they came from.
"Just like how certain people are prejudiced and racist against black people, a great majority of the community of South Central believes that all police are bad," says Ripp, who believes he was justified in withholding facts from his cast. "I knew it would be hard to convince them a white filmmaker could do this film, let alone a white filmmaker that also happens to be a police officer."
Ripp says he received abundant support from both his cast members and Watts community leaders, one of whom became the executive producer of his film. (Most still do not know about his police work.) With their help, he shot his film in just 12 days during the summer of 2000, as a gang war raged nearby. Several times, locations had to be changed because of gang violence. (Ripp counted 30 shootings during the course of filming.)
