A DAY IN THE LIFE
Reviewer: Harry Davenport
Rated: 18 (UK)
Release Date: 27th June 2011
Director: Sticky Fingaz
Cast: Sticky Fingaz, Mekhi Phifer, Omar Epps, Faizon Love, Michael Rapaport, Bokeem Woodbine
A Day in the Life is a rap musical. It features no memorable music and tells a dull, nasty story of gang warfare in LA. It stars Sticky Fingaz, who also wrote and directed this appalling film. It is without a doubt one of the worst films ever made right alongside Battlefield Earth and Dungeons and Dragons.
A rap musical could possibly work but like any musical you need an interesting premise and memorable songs, this provides neither. The film has a constant hip-hop beat, which becomes nauseating, while the actors rap their lines. The rapping is not original, memorable, or well produced.
The film is astonishingly offensive. It glamorises the gang world, showing them living in beautiful Beverly Hills homes, fu****g beautiful bitches (their words not mine). The gang war is shown as fun, exciting, and even funny. One of the many shooting montages has a man shot on the toilet and the shooter pulling a face saying “ohhh what a nasty smell” holding his nose. Another sequence has the protagonist shooting his way though a house. When he bumps into a Mexican maid who pleads in Spanish not to be killed he kills her out of annoyance for comic relief.
The presence of Michael Kenneth Williams is upsetting. He has delivered some amazing performances over the last few years in Boardwalk Empire, Life During Wartime and as Oumar in The Wire. How can such a good actor, who seems to make good choices, go from a show that shows how ridiculous and tragic the gang world is, to one that glamorises it.
The morality of the film is fundamentally corrupt, with songs about how snitches deserve to die. The nasty protagonist decides to leave “the game” when his girlfriend gets pregnant, tired of looking over his shoulder. However he never seems to regret the horrible things he has done to get rich, saying things like you need to these things in order to survive. The film is sickening.
The film also looks terrible. The camerawork is shoddy and it is poorly lit, making the film look like a medium quality porno. The editing is also shockingly bad, adding to the nauseating feel of the film. If you need to be sick and you don’t want to stick your fingers down your throat watch A Day in the Life. The films many shootouts look like they were made by 13 year old wrestling fans that wanted to film an action film. Very very poor.
If you are a fan of rap, musicals or films avoid this at all costs.
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