God Has a Rap Sheet

Rating:
Summary: Wants to do good, but flawed
Review: "God Has A Rap Sheet," is a movie that wants to good but is numbingly flawed. Essentially, the premise of the film is that several characters of mixed races find themselves in prison in an over-night holding cell and exchange in a war of words between each other; sometimes peacefully and other times angrily. Within the cell too is an old and dirty homeless man claiming to be God. I understand what the director was trying to do here, which is essentially to create a dialogue between the different races of New York. However, there are several things I did not like in this film and are listed as follows:

1) As the film begins it is established how everyone got arrested. However, later in the film only one or two of these stories is examined further and at an inconsistent pace.
2) The acting in the film is inconsistent too. While maybe the actors playing "God," "the Arab," and "the Jew" are believeable the rest seem out of place in their roles and the acting between them seems fake and shallow (if you see the film, you'll know what I mean).
3) The actions between the characters is too repetitious and follows something of: Action-Conflict-Confrontation-Resolution. This goes in a circular motion till each character has confronted each and every other. (those who've seen the film will notice the British and Asian-American record executive tandem that stick out, acting wise, like a sore-thumb.
4) Each character seems to have a good understanding of one or two races, but at the same time, is completely oblivious to the others. The African and Latino can relate to the Italian, but think all Jews are lawyers and sleep with money (literally). The Irish can understand the Italian but God help him if he can understand "n@ggers and s@icks." The Arab man understands the Latino and Black people, but wont let his children watch t.v. because its polluted with Jewish propaganda...and on and on. Meanwhile God, mediates the whole conversation with seemingly obvious solutions to their problems. True that people are ignorant, but the nature of truth is not as black and white as the director seems to assume in this film. And the answers not as seemingly obvious as presented.

"God Has A Rap Sheet's" redeeming quality however is that it seeks to do good by examining the "Miranda Complex" that exist's in the international society and locally within American culture. The film is brave in its examination of this. However, I only feel that it is deserving of two stars for being overly preachy, stylistically inconsistent, and poorly acted.

Rating:
Summary: Ex-Jerky Boy goes for the gold
Review: Being a big Jerky Boy fan, I recently purchased Kamal Ahmed's God Has a Rap Sheet not knowing what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised by this movie and completely blown away. The story is about 8 guys of completely different backgrounds who are arrested for the night and share the cell with a scruffy insane homeless man, who claims to be god. The dialogue was as real as I've ever heard and the acting was superior (considering I've never seen any of these actors before). Though the movie has the gritty low budget feel to it and makes you actually feel the sweat and stink of the jail cell, it makes you feel like you're a part of it. I half-heartedly was expecting it to be a jerky boy type lowbrow humor movie, but Kamal Ahmed went for the gold with this. I was shocked that he was this talented (he also did the music with his band). This movie is as independent as it gets, no frills, no names but delivers a powerful punch true to an independent film. There are discussions to religion, race, sex and just about anything else you can think of. It's all done inside this jail and did not get me bored for one minute even though it took place the entire time mostly in this jail. I can't wait to see this movie on IFC or Sundance. This movie should be right up their alley.