Part of Summer Night Cinema: 50 Years of Hip Hop, celebrating the art form's impact on music, film, and pop culture. Curated by critic Ernest Hardy.
Hype Williams’s 1998 hybrid arthouse-meets-hip-hop film classic boasts an all-star cast and is a touchstone for heads who relish its upheaval of “hood flick” genre conventions. The film garnered mixed reviews upon its initial release, but its gorgeous (and sometimes gorgeously demented) visuals, Belly has become an undeniable cult classic. And though cast with absolute hip hop legends—Nas, DMX, Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins, Method Man—it’s sleek, glistening Taral Hicks and a slyly inspired performance by bewigged, bespectacled Tyrin Turner that steal the show.
(1998, dir: Hype Williams, color, 96 minutes)
Summer Night Cinema is sponsored by Carla Emil and Rich Silverstein
