Black and White (1999)
37 %
Reviews Counted: 76 Fresh: 28 Rotten:48 Average Rating: 4.7/10
Consensus:
The atmosphere is affecting, and the story, at times, is compelling, but with a lean script and limp direction, Black and White doesn't add up to much.
Runtime: 1 hr 38 mins
Synopsis: With Black and White, writer-director James Toback (Fingers, Two Girls and a Guy) confronts the topic of race head on--most specifically, the influence of black urban hip-hop culture on white America. Set in New York City as the 1990s wind to a close, the film is told in a broad, episodic... [More]
Genre: Dramas
Starring: Robert Downey, Bijou Phillips, Allan Houston, Brooke Shields, Ben Stiller
Buy It On DVD
Reviews
A daring film that has some sloppy flaws but is far better than Toback's previous effort, the dismal Two Girls and a Guy.
Comment
08/07/08
As lively and amusing as the film is in some ways, it does set up expectations at the outset that are never really delivered upon.
06/17/08
Top Critic
It looks like a mess -- if one stuffed with incident, issues and intrigue.
06/24/06
Top Critic
James Toback's Black and White is meant to be an incendiary movie, but it's really only just OK.
05/26/06
Mostly watchable and well-acted, but neither as engaging nor as exciting as it needs to be.
03/16/04
While Toback certainly makes a game effort to study the infiltration of hip-hop into the mainstream, his inability to choose what ground to cover ultimately results in an episodic hotch-potch.
01/13/04
Short bursts of captivating information are strung together in a series of quick-cutting vignettes, alternately hitting their mark and falling disastrously flat.
05/14/03
The unfocused story travels through so many subplots that none of the individual stories are ever explored fully enough to pay off.
12/08/02
Perhaps you remember "The Pick-Up Artist," the movie that single-handedly killed Molly Ringwald's career? That was another Toback production. "Black and White," for all its arty pretensions and supposed shock value, doesn't break his losing streak.
06/21/02
It doesn't try to spell out all aspects of the issue or arrive at any particular point. Toback presents specific characters dealing with specific problems and, through their stories, somehow manages to take the temperature of the times.
06/18/02
Top Critic Top Critic
This movie doesn't provide the luxury of detachment; it forces us to sort out the confusing racial dramas of contemporary America, and it's far more involving because it has no narrator telling us what to feel.
01/09/02
This lively mess proves that when Toback loses his head, he does it with style.
05/10/01
Top Critic
A study in multiculturalism, Toback's film is something of a melting-pot itself: mixed-up, messy and teeming with vitality.
04/17/01
Amateurish in the worst possible way and sorely lacking ideas or any sign of intelligent life.
03/24/01
The only Black and White issue here is this: The film is bad, there's no gray area.
01/01/00
Top Critic Top Critic
There is probably way too much plot slung around. But Toback is fearless. Which is precisely what is needed to enjoy this primal film -- a sense of absolute fearlessness.
01/01/00
Toback's method of presenting the evidence without judgment backfires, finally appearing just as shapeless as the movie's structure.
01/01/00
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