Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

Majorthebys Charming and brutal

ChicDragon It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

EitoMan The Good: This was an informative, compellingly structured documentary on the genesis and evolution of LA gangs. The story is told via an oral history by first generation gang members and then proceeds to unfold with more contemporary members (and ex-members). The film contains a high degree of advocacy (especially in the final 30 minutes) that seems reasonable.The Not so Good: The director clearly lays the blame for gangs and gang violence on Caucasians. Although there is no disputing that institutionalized racism of slavery on up to the end of segregation definitely created gross economic and social injustices, the director fails to make a compelling case that whites directly caused inner city blacks to wage war on each other for decades. The director touches on some of the more salient factors, such as factory jobs (i.e. unskilled labor) opportunities disappearing, but fails to identify that as a root cause. Instead, we are presented with numerous examples of institutional and individual racism--including conspiracy theories involving Iran-Contra, J. Edgar Hoover, LAPD, et.al. Nowhere within this otherwise excellent documentary does the director touch on individual responsibility, personal morals, etc. Gang members (including murderers) are presented as victims of society. The director focuses much attention on the Black Panther and US movement of the 60s and 70s however this narrative is presented mostly to advance a conspiracy theory of how the FBI sought to destroy the groups, ultimately resulting in a lack of political power and community disarray. He goes on to try and blame the influx of drugs into the community as an orchestrated effort by Washington to fund the Contras.This film is good and worth a viewing. It provides an interesting insight into the evolution of LA gangs as well as how some African Americans perceive history. Unfortunately the director focuses too much time on trying to shift blame away from the violent trigger-pullers who admittedly were, and are, his friends. He is trying to shape history in a way that absolves his community of responsibility for the violence in order to empower them to find a way out of that lifestyle. This film presents that case well (although not compelling to me); hopefully it will help the next generation steer clear of joining gangs.

Jaymay Having worked with both Bloods and Crips as a volunteer in Central Juvenile Hall in Los Angeles, I found Bastards of the Party to be a gripping and extremely important work -- setting down the historical record about the rise of gangs in South Central L.A. This should be required viewing in all Juvenile Halls and prisons. And important viewing for anyone who lives in Los Angeles as well!What struck me about the movie is its relevance to the current foreign policy of the United States. The policies of the LAPD and the laws in California, such as "Three Strikes," which fill our prisons to overflowing with black and Latino young men, are in place because they are politically expedient: saying that you are tough on crime is the easiest way to get elected in this city and in this state. I personally know a kid who got a 50 year prison sentence because he was in a car when another kid shot a gun at two rival gang members -- and missed. It was his first felony. Ask yourself, does that punishment fit the crime?There is no more ironclad way to get elected in America than by saying you are "tough on defense." George W. Bush gets criticized for lots of things, but when he says that "Islamist extremists" are out to destroy our children for no other reason than that they hate us, no one contradicts him. Middle eastern Muslims have become the preferred "other" to demonize and dehumanize and fear. I don't mean to minimize the point of this film -- that if L.A. gang members become more self aware about their situation, maybe they can start to move past this cycle of violence that they did not initially create.But I'm just saying that it's happening again now on the world stage. The American government is using the same propaganda techniques, the same agent provocateurs in the Middle East. Do you really think it was an Sunni Arab who blew up the Golden Mosque of Samarra and unleashed this huge civil war? Get real. Now, Iraqis are slaughtering each other by the hundreds of thousands, just like gang members have murdered each other here in Los Angeles for decades. And yes, there is growing movement in this country for us to get our troops out of Iraq. But no one talks about the Iraqi-on-Iraqi carnage that we have been party to.In any case, I congratulate Cle on his work, I hope it increases the peace here in L.A. For every single retaliation that it stops, it saves dozens of lives down the line.

tblake-choice After viewing the movie, it took me back because I know quite a few of the people in the movie, as well the director. When I went to see the movie, I did not think that I would be receiving a history about gangs. The history is what made the movie quite interesting. When we went outside after viewing the movie, I told Bone, "The youngsters really need to see this movie so that they can see they are doing to their generation." As I am a "bastard" of a civil rights activist, she always says, "Your generation just kills and fights for no cause." Now, I can really understand what the meaning behind her phrase pertains to. The following day after I viewed the movie, I went home and told my mom about it and that she may be interested in the movie. At that particular time, she did not know anything about the movie, but after she went the African Market Place, she came home and new all about the movie as some of her old activist friends told her about it. Now, she is ready to see it, along with a group of her friends.I am very proud of Bone and his accomplishments. It takes a strong person to want to change themselves after believing certain things for so many years.

noralee I saw a "screening print" of "Bastards of the Party" at the Tribeca Film Festival.It's helpful to understand the full arc of the documentary as a longitudinal exploration of the roots of gang and police violence in Los Angeles in order to get past the opening section to when the theme is finally declared.The first part is a salute to the Black Panther Party in California in the 1960's that is at first repetition of the usual history and then degenerates further into interviews with self-aggrandizing, middle-aged survivors posturing for posterity in an effort to preserve the images of themselves they want to project as a legacy that becomes my-eyes-glaze-over cliché-ridden rhetoric for the viewer.Then director/on screen narrator/participant-witness Cle Shaheed "Bone" Sloan comes on the screen to explain his thesis and the movie really starts getting interesting - that the gangs of L.A. are the titular descendants of the Panthers. He then proceeds to go through the changes in Los Angeles decade by decade, though not strictly chronologically, sociologically, culturally, economically and politically (as well as very personally) to demonstrate how the current volatile racial situation step by step resulted from the destruction of the Party. It serves as chilling non-fiction background to TV series "The Shield," for L.A., and "The Wire," for how applicable it is to many inner cities across the country.This very much comes across as a story about outlets for testosterone as basic as throughout human history, here channeled in the late twentieth century through the police, politicians, the media and the drug and violence dealing gangs they in some sense created.Rather than focusing on the usual truisms about single mother-headed families, though we do hear some ranting about dysfunctional family clichés, we see what happened to the men in the African-American community from childhood on under oppressive economic and political conditions, though no mention is made of whatever impact the welfare system had, laid out as if it is a passionate Ken Burns documentary on Reconstruction.We also don't hear much about nonviolent alternatives rejected or wasted, because the camera focuses on the most charismatic spokesmen -- even if what they are saying is preening bull for the camera. I think that at a certain point even the director realizes the gang members' strenuous comparisons of themselves to the Panthers sound like delusions of grandeur and self-justification. The older gangsters reflecting on the world they want to make now for their children is touching, as it contradicts stereotypes of African-American fathers in the inner city.But we don't even hear from a woman until near the end as a mother cries about the funeral of her son. And then the funerals mount up, as movingly as any film about genocide.The finale, however, weakens the impact of the film as the director appears on screen as a former gang banger (and in excerpts from TV interviews, such as with Larry King) just as self-aggrandizing as the opening subjects so we start questioning his credibility.The film is also weakened when the changes are explained in left-wing jargon, especially as mouthed by white professors (and it's a shame that virtually no non-white academic experts are interviewed for at least visual balance), though a Senate staffer is very convincing about conspiracies by just factually summarizing a report.The astounding archival photos and videos capture the zeitgeist, especially in striking material from individuals as we see hair and fashions authentically change.The film was executive produced by Antoine Fuque, for whom the director acted in "Training Day," but other credits were missing in the print and I assume some music as the lack of much hip hop on the soundtrack was inexplicable otherwise, particularly as rap gets zero mention in the film as any kind of influence.With the extreme language and images in the film, PBS is not an option as a future outlet.