Foreign and American Slums as Portrayed in "Boys N the Hood" and "City of God"

Boys N the Hood is a 1991 American film written and directed by John Singleton. The story focuses on three black male youths that are growing up in south-central Los Angeles. The three take separate paths as they grow, but are caught up in criminal activities within their neighborhood just the same. For comparison, City of God is a Portuguese film, released in 2002, and directed by Fernando Meirelles and Katia Lund. This film is adapted from a book published in 1997 that tells of the true to life events that took place on the streets of the City of God. Gang rivalries dominate the local culture, and constant wars make life rough and unpredictable. In my argument, I sustain that the representation of black males as disadvantaged Americans experiencing a unique set of cultural circumstances in Boyz N the Hood is refuted by the similar representation of black males living in Latin America in City of God.

The protagonist of each story, Tre in Boyz and Rocket in City, are very similar in a number of ways. Neither boys are well clothed in their youth. “Men use clothing to define and represent distinctive identities based on lifestyle.”(DiMaggio, 1) This is an important technique because it contributes to the understanding that their characters are still undeveloped. As the boys age, we see them wearing proper outfits. The clothing even becomes trendy. We see Tre wearing a quality name brand outfit at the barbeque and Rocket at Benny’s goodbye party. To these characters, brand names are a sign of social standing. Although the outfits they are wearing are not the clothing of men, such as suits or dress clothes, they are far nicer than the clothing of their youth. The clothing symbolizes that the men are coming along in their growth but have not achieved full development.

Both Tre and Rocket also struggle with achieving sexual maturity. This is another sign that they are not fully developed as men both physically and characteristically. This crucial point helps the characters maintain their supposed innocence and sets them apart from the other men in the slums. The other men are sexually mature and consistently exhibit violent behavior. The protagonists do not engage in deliberate violence or express true anger until just before they achieve sexual maturity. Rocket explodes in anger at the newspaper lady in an unforeseen manner just prior to his first sexual experience and Tre has an angry outburst that is uncharacteristic until he encounters his first sexual experience.

The innocence of Tre and Rocket in their youth plays a role in a scene that is shared by both films depicting a ball being taken by older teenagers. In Boyz, a football is stolen in an act that violates the trust of the boys. As the scene comes to an end, Tre and his friends are leaving believing the ball is long lost, only to have it returned by a thug with a heart. Likewise, in City, a soccer ball is destroyed by the older boys. The ball is ruined by violence in the form of gunfire, but the same boys who damage the ball pay ten times over for its replacement. Both scenes are foreshadowing the future violence in the boy’s life and challenge the viewer to see both the violent nature and humanity of the older boys. Ironically, the older boys are drawn into the playful interactions of the innocent boys, but subsequently ruin that innocence through their violent behavior, and then long to make the wrong into right.

There are many similarities between other roles as well. “Ricky is the more "positive" of the brothers” in Boyz, as is Benny in City (Seelow, 1). Both are men who misbehave in some way. Ricky has a child at a young age, while Benny assists Ze in creating his empire. Despite these facts, they are largely seen as good innocent men who are going to successfully escape the slums. Both men are seen in very different attire than their counterparts. This acts as a strong visual separation for the audience. Ricky is seen in football jerseys and ultimately in a white button-down shirt in his death scene. The white shirt drenched in blood is an obvious symbol of innocence. Benny is seen in trendy clothing that is very different than the men in his gang. Ricky is killed on the day he would have found out that he was getting out of the hood, while Benny was killed on the night before he was supposed to be leaving the slum for the farm life. Both incidents illustrate the difficulty in escaping the slums. The deaths of both characters also share similar causes. Both men die as a result of their tangled interactions with their negative foils, Lil Ze and Doughboy. Ricky begins the sequence of events inevitably leading to his murder by causing a scene over a minor infraction. This infraction is instigated by Doughboy’s desire for intimidation and control as he shows his gun to a rival posse. Benny chose to align with Lil Ze and is ultimately killed as a result of Lil Ze’s behavior against other inhabitants of the slum.

We see a connection between Doughboy and Lil Ze. Both start out as children who commit a crime and desire control over their environment in later life. This can be seen in Doughboy’s constant watch from his front porch and in Ze’s murderous behavior in his slum. The controlling and arrogant nature of both boys ultimately leads to the death of their “pure” counterparts.
Both films tell the story of the main characters over many years. This time span allows the viewers to recognize the innocence of the older more violent gangsters. Without seeing the characters as youth experiencing a dark world, the viewer would not be able to identify and feel remorse for the older characters.

There is also a shared increase in the complexity of the environments the characters live in between the two films. In the beginning of Boyz, we see a neighborhood that is limited to small street scenes. As the movie progresses, we see trips into other neighborhoods such as when Furious Styles takes the boys to see the billboard. Likewise, at the beginning of City, the slum is seen as simple rows of simple houses, but as the film continues we find ourselves deeper and deeper into a maze of allyways, apartment complexes, and staircases. In the final battle in City, there are complex scenes of passageways and buildings, symbolizing how the violence reaches into every corner, drawing boys from every place.

When the boys are young, there is little mention of commercialism. The characters are poorly clothed and entertain themselves with simple sports. Their earnings are meager and earned through simple employment such as selling fish and doing chores. As the boys age, we immediately see the introduction of popular music in both films, clothing becomes brand-name, jobs become entry-level professional, and entertainment is found in night clubs and car shows. “As a street kid, Rocket takes up photojournalism as a way to bust out and to understand his life.” (Travers, 1) The introduction of global ideas and products occurs at the same time as the shift to violence is seen in the young men. It is very clear that as materialism increases, violence also increases. In the climactic scenes of the films, Ricky makes a purchase just before his death, while Benny is killed just after he tries to pass on an expensive camera to Rocket. Lil Ze is killed as a result of chasing a chicken, a commodity in the culture, and the gangsters who kill Ricky in Boyz are killed just while eating at a fast-food joint. Both movies show places of commerce as targets of violent behavior.

In Boys n the hood, the boys may take alternate paths to maturity, but are ultimately stalled by the inexorable draw of their hood and the associated criminal activity. City of God also emphasizes the inescapable nature of events that take place in the slums. From the comparison of these two films, it is clearly evident that the notion of the typical American “hood” in which blacks males are thought to have a serious disadvantage in leading quality lives is not actually constrained just to American cities.

Bibliography:

DiMaggio, Paul. "Fashion and Its Social Agendas: Class, Gender, and Identity in Clothing.” Contemporary Sociology 31.3 (2002): 303-304. Research Library. ProQuest. Georgia Tech Library. 8 Mar. 2009

Seelow, David. "Look Forward in Anger: Young, Black Males and the New Cinema.” Journal of Men's Studies 5.2 (1996): 153. Research Library. ProQuest. Georgia Tech Library. 8 Mar. 2009

Peter Travers. "City of God.” Rolling Stone 24 Jun 2004: 188. Research Library. ProQuest. Georgia Tech Library. 8 Mar. 2009