Drumline

December 15, 2002

For a more straight forward experience at the movies, I’d personally push for everyone to check out Drumline, the new movie about marching bands at historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs). Anyone that’s seen the Bayou Classic each year knows that the marching bands in this arena are a far cry from your usual lock-step crew. The marching and the playing are married with a little hip shaking flair and funk.

The movie itself is a pretty standard fish-out-of-water/Rocky combo plot. Like last year’s “Bring It On,” it saves itself with warm, likable characters and absolutely electrifying “action” set pieces. It’s a bit weird to think of half-time performances as must-see events, but the material is shot and edited well, and choreographed to an unreal degree. Like 8-Mile’s freestyle battles, the drumline faceoffs carry the drama to it’s payoff in a much more satisfying manner than the actual narrative.

As a bonus, despite being filled with a bunch of Black people, nobody gets shot. Yay!

Posted in Moving Pictures