Jeanskynebu
the audience applauded
Nessieldwi
Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.
Taha Avalos
The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.
Phillipa
Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.
jfgibson73
State Property kept me interested all the way through. It was basically the same story as Scarface, but set in Philadelphia: a guy with nothing decides he wants to make a lot of money, so he starts killing people until he is the main drug dealer in his area. I want to say the movie was well written, but I feel like it's hard to tell if there was a script or if the actors were mostly improvising. The dialog feels very natural, and I believed pretty much every performance. Beanie Siegel carries the story as the no-nonsense central character. He is very straightforward and blunt about confronting every obstacle to his business. As the story progresses, I felt like there was a logic to most of his decisions, even when he was doing something crooked. For example, if he decided to kill other drug dealers to get them out of his way, it wasn't too shocking, since they had to know it was a dangerous lifestyle. But when Beans threatens a character named Ceasar, it felt like a turning point in the movie. Beans meets Ceasar in his detail shop and tells him he has to work for him. Ceasar comes off as being very straightforward, telling Beans that if he did this, it would put him in the middle of him and another dealer, explaining that he couldn't just change allegiance without endangering his own life. Instead of seeing it from Ceasar's point of view, Beans just guns him down. It felt different from the rest of the violence in the movie because Ceasar wasn't arguing with or disrespecting Beans, he was just explaining what would happen if he did what Beans wanted. It seemed like a very unprovoked response, and it ends up leading to Beans' arrest and conviction. Ceasar lives and goes to court, but is blackmailed into changing his mind about testifying against Beans. The judge still sends Beans away, and the movie ends, but I already have the sequel going, so I'll let you know where it goes from here. Hopefully it's more of the same, because I never got bored watching part 1. One minor disappointment: I didn't feel like they made much use of the setting. I would've like to have seen more details specific to Philadelphia.I've noticed that a lot of these low budget straight to video movies set in the hood seem to find a lot of actors and actresses who give performances that feel very naturalistic. I don't feel like I can see them "acting," they just seem to "be" their characters. The dialog doesn't have a cadence that sounds recited-- It seems like a common thread I am finding in movies from this genre. I'd be curious to know if the filmmakers are casting people they know and everyone is just naturally talented, or if the people in the movie are even real actors with careers. Maybe they are actually from the city where the movie is made and it's just easy to be themselves on screen. For whatever reason, I feel more like I'm watching real people than when I put on, say, an indie drama or a J-horror.
dogglebe
This movie should've been called 'Urban Stereotypes For Dummies' as it uses every cliché imaginable. The story is a Scarface-wannabe, street thugs rising up in the drug world. While Scarface may have glorified this type of life, this movie just dragged out a plot that it couldn't successfully deliver. The acting is non-existent. I've seen better cold readings than this. And the directing just plain stunk. Too many close ups. The director should consider using medium and long shots on occasion. I'm going to change my cable provider if movies like this are the best they can offer.
p-stepien
Fade in. Show picture of hommies. Enter voice-over. Beans (Beanie Sigel) tells us what a dog eat dog world this is. All about the Benjamins y'all. Enter titles sequence - lots of pole dancing, close shots of silicon enhanced nipples and focus on ho's wiggling that thang! Camera focus on Beanie and Baby Boy getting down with the girlies. Enter brain light-bulb. Beanie thinks: Yo, had enough of being a poor mother... Time to get rich or die trying. Six weeks later: Beans, Baby Boy and a couple of thugs start randomly shooting drug dealers in broad daylight to take over their business. No police or thugs to hand out pay-back. A year later: Beans rules all, moves out to the suburb, but still shoots, kills or whatever. A dozen or so incoherent sequences of hood crime idiocy later the movie ends. Yo! That was so not cool! Bad acting, terrible phony script (or more like random parts of scripts clinging together with the use of duct tape) and a tiresome 90 minutes of low-budget pointlessness. Not much more to add but honestly avoid at all costs. It may be low-budget, but that does not take the director off the hook of making something as tacky and superficial as this. Why the hell did anyone make a second part?
CovertEquation
This movie was an excuse for Jay-z to claim he had something to do with the production of a a movie. This was one of the two movies I have ever seen that I couldn't finish it was too horrible. After seeing it, I asked someone to explain it to me, so here is what I gather. This Beans character is very down on his luck man, and would like to change this. He then starts out a gang called "ABM" which was later explained to me to mean "All aBout Money" why it wouldn't be AAM is just just depressing. Then he beats people up, and seems to be quite the hate filled individual. Then Jay Z shows up in a car for some reason then the movie was over.