Rating:
  Broadcast Date: February 20, 2007
  Website: Documentary Website
  TV Station: PBS

“Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats & Rhymes” Movie Review
When I was a kid, I was a big fan of the Rambo movies. I remember thinking Rambo was so cool, as he would parachute into a jungle with only his big ass knife, sneak his way into an enemy camp, free the prisoners of war and kill everybody else. He was an American hero.

For my birthday one year, I asked my mom for a plastic toy Rambo knife. I told her that I needed it to protect our neighborhood and free American prisoners from Vietnamese bad guys in our back yard. I remember her looking at me and saying, “Honey, Rambo isn’t real. That’s just a movie. It’s for entertainment. People don’t really go around killing other people.” Now as simple as that sounds, I understood what she was saying.

And to be honest with you, that concept is understood in American culture today. Nobody thinks that Rambo really killed all those people. Nobody thinks that Riggs & Murtaugh are real cops. Nobody thinks that Arnold is really the Terminator. Those movies aren’t representative of real life, they’re just entertainment. And everyone knows that. Yet for some reason, everybody thinks that rap videos and radio songs are not just entertainment … that they are real life.

I guess that’s why I was really excited to see the premiere of Byron Hurt’s “Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats & Rhymes” on PBS last night. It takes a lot of courage to take on topics such as homophobia, misogyny and hyper-masculinity in hip-hop today, and I applaud Hurt for his efforts on our behalf. In addition, I thought the documentary would surely show that these traits are not representative of all hip-hop, just the entertainment aspect. Unfortunately, this was not the case.

While I do feel that the documentary was very well done, I think it may have been mis-titled. Instead of “Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats & Rhymes,” this documentary should have been titled “Mainstream Rap Music: Beyond Beats & Rhymes.” Because throughout the entire 60 minute broadcast, all I kept thinking to myself was, “This is not hip-hop; at least not what hip-hop is to me.”

Two Sides of a Story
I felt that Hurt’s documentary was completely one-sided. For example, one scene showed an interview between Hurt and Busta Rhymes, Talib Kweli, Mos Def and De La Soul. When Hurt popped the question about homosexuality in hip-hop, Busta spit some angry response, got up and walked out. Yet the scene ended before Kweli or Mos’ responses. I assume that both had something more intelligent and less hateful to say than Busta, but their comments obviously didn’t make the documentary. And no alternate viewpoint was provided, as if all hip-hoppers are homophobic.

In another example, Hurt visited BET’s Spring Bling, which is basically their version of MTV’s Spring Break, and showed clips of men objectifying scantily-clad women in disgusting and disrespectful manners (surprised, anyone?). They then showed clips of rappers, all of whom talked about being hard, gang-banging, killing people and smacking bitches. Yet again, no alternate viewpoint was presented. If he would have gone to, let’s say, the Hip-Hop Theater Festival, there would have been no disrespectful treatment of women and nothing but positive and conscious lyrics being spit. I know because I was there [1]. But we were only shown the first viewpoint, as if all hip-hoppers are ignorant gang-banging sodomites.

And finally, Hurt taped a couple interviews with white people on their opinions of the violence and negativity that surrounds hip-hop, making sure to pick the most ignorant white people on the face of the earth. One cat, who was sadly from my hometown of Columbus, Ohio, referred to African-Americans as “colored people,” and the girl interviewed was obviously an upper-class punk-rocker chick who had very little understanding of hip-hop music or culture. As if they were at all representative of real white hip-hoppers.

With the exception of all-too-short statements made by KRS-One, Talib Kweli, Mos Def and M-1 of Dead Prez, I don’t believe that anyone with any sort of intelligence was featured on this documentary. No conscious emcees or true followers of hip-hop culture were shown … just mainstream corporate-backed rappers and their not-able-to-tell-the-difference-between-real-life-and-entertainment fans. And that’s not hip-hop … that’s just entertainment.

Now I’m not denying that homophobia, misogamy and hyper-masculinity exist in hip-hop. Because, unfortunately, this rap shit is hip-hop too. But as a journalist and historian I would think it would be Byron Hurt’s responsibility to show both sides of the story. If I wanted to, I could easily create a documentary proving that negativity does not exist in hip-hop by including only footage of KRS-One or the Roots or Def Jux, by covering the homo-hop movement in San Francisco, or by going to Hip-Hop Congress or National Hip-Hop Political Convention meetings. But that would be one-sided.

“Hip-Hop is Americana”
Yet the one thing I did like about the documentary was it’s effectiveness in demonstrating how violence, masculinity and homophobia are tied to American culture and politics, with footage of hyper-masculine leaders and actors such as George W. Bush, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Clint Eastwood. Hip-Hop seems to take the majority of the criticism for this negativity, when it so clearly exists everywhere you look in this country, from politics and foreign policy to advertising, music and television.

Overall, I found the documentary entertaining and informative, just overly one-sided and forced. As if we were to make a documentary about violence in American culture by citing Rambo, the Terminator and Lethal Weapon. When you watch it, I hope you realize that the images you see are not representative of real hip-hop, just the mainstream rap music pushed to the American public for entertainment purposes. And yes, that type of hip-hop is way too violent, materialistic, misogynistic, homophobic and hyper-masculine. But it is not representative of all hip-hop … it’s just entertainment.