I do not know if its a signifier of race or age – probably both – that my list of top five rappers begins and ends with the Beastie Boys. And maybe Kanye.
But at a time when an all American institution like “The Tonight Show” has The Roots as its house band, its obvious the mainstream has become diverse and inclusive.
In a similar way Chris Rock’s heartfelt “Top Five” is so culturally specific as if preaching to the converted, while also contextually universal without missing a beat or sacrificing its street cred.
Rock wrote, directed and stars as a comic stereotyped by a string of bad but commercially successful movies, in which he plays a crime fighting bear, whose name people shout at him on the street. Think Tyler Perry as Madea (who endures some abuse here as he did in “Dear White People”).
He is notorious for his public intoxication arrests but is in recovery, and his marriage to a reality TV star is going to be filmed for her series. He is also in career crisis and his new film, a drama about a Haitian revolutionary, has fallen on deaf ears.
To promote it he reluctantly agrees to spend a day with a reporter, played by Rosario Dawson, with whom he has more in common than either knows.
As he promotes the film, they spend the day, and night walking the streets of Manhattan and getting to know each other, in conversation and quirky encounters that peel away protective layers to reveal the person within.
Rock has a fondness for Woody Allen whose fans will find the neurotic vibe, barbed asides and New York setting familiar. As with Allen all the characters sound like they are speaking in Rock’s voice. A standout sequence features an insult marathon at a rowdy family gathering.
This intimate story is also rooted in the independent DIY aesthetic of films like “Before Sunset,” with Julie Delpy, who wrote-directed and starred in her own version of the formula – “2 Days in New York,” co-starring Rock.
Rock works blue, and the film includes crude and vulgar moments in flashbacks and frequent use of a racial epithet. There is also a brief police beating.
The top five rappers question runs through the film and is a touchstone shared by all the characters.
Even Jerry Seinfeld, seen hilariously throwing Benjamins in the air at Rock’s bachelor party, answers it.
Rock is a better stand up comic than an actor. But this is one of his top five performances.
Three stars
With Chris Rock, Rosario Dawson, Gabrielle Union, Kevin Hart, Whoopi Goldberg, Jerry Seinfeld, Adam Sandler, Tracy Morgan, J.B. Smoove, Cedric the Entertainer, Shari Shepherd, Leslie Jones. Produced by Eli Bush, Barry Diller, Scott Rudin. Written and directed by Chris Rock. Rated R; pervasive language, nudity, drug use. Approximate running time: 102 minutes.
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