GHETT'A LIFE REVIEW
by Andrés González:

My favorite character by far is Gully Rat, mainly because he has the strongest (or at least the most noticeable) character arc of the whole film. It also helps that Kadeem Wilson probably is the second best performance out of the bunch right behind Kevoy Burton as Derrickson. But seriously, the tale about a gang member learning to appreciate his adversaries, not only through sport, but through genuine human connection holds something very powerful, specially considering the whole context around the film. Is this resource used as effectively as possible? No, but it tries it's darndest and that's really appreciated. I feel like his final sacrifice is what solidified him as my favorite character. In a better film, that moment would have been as emotionally riveting as many high brow productions.

The way this film tackles Jamaican politics is actually very unique and interesting, despite my many, many gripes with the subsequent drama. It showcases how dangerous and blatant political violence became in Jamaica. Taking over the country, separating cities into gang/politician controled neighborhoods always fighting for dominance. Indoctrinating it's otherwise-normal citizens into hating the 'other side', either by fabricating narratives or staging political killings. The fact that it's election year in the film's narrative just accentuates the tension between the PNP and JNP gangs to an intolerable degree.

The portrayal of women in the film, besides being relatively better than The Harder They Come, leaves alot to be desired. Yeah, they are given a bigger part in the overarching narrative, and the film doesn't forget about them halfway through (like The Harder They Come), but they are still given next to nothing in comparison to their male counterparts.

Camella is the shell of a character. We literally know nothing about her by the end of the film outside of being the coach's granddaughter and Derrickson's love interest. What makes it worse is that she's given a particularly strong introduction, with her challenging Derrickson's attempt at recovering his lost football, but all her gravitas and strong demeanor is snatched away two scenes later, becoming a hollow support figure with zero development (asides from kissing our main character).

Dawn gets a better cut of the deal, but not by a large margin. She's given some agency (which is a first in the two films we've seen so far), and she carries plenty of emotional scenes on her back, but still, it's not all that great. And this isn't about her nonexistent role in politics and whatnot, of course a film set in sexist-as-hell Jamaica won't portray women in a position of power, but my issue is that she doesn't hold much power in the narrative drive either. Her biggest moment in the film literally is getting shot at. She's given power by being taken out of the film, and that's a real shame.

THE HARDER THEY COME REVIEW
by Andrés González:

I guess what I liked the most about this film was it's sheer unpreditability. It's a truly bizarre, wild ride from start to finish, which kept me and my classmates at the edge of our seats the entire time. I don't think it's really all that good, but it seriously was one of the best & most entertaining cinematic experiences I've had the whole year. What starts as a fairly normal underdog story about a reggae musician quickly turns into a weird Scorcese/psycho-thriller mashup. I'm pretty sure no one saw that coming, but we had a blast. The incompetent special effects, the awkward dialogue/line delivery and the non-stop twist and turns just made it even better, in a charming way. Plus, some of the camerawork, specially the use of zooms was actually very impressive.

On the other hand, what I didn't like about the film, outside of certain plot points and characters that didn't convince me all that much, was it's portrayal of women, of course. Specially the character of Elsa, played by Janet Bartley, who's presence is really under-utilized, dissapearing for most of the third act of the film; almost as if the filmmakers forgot about her altogether while they were writting and quickly gave a her a couple more scenes when they realized about her absence. The lack of agency given to female characters is bothersome, but the lack of female characters overall is even worse.

If I had to pick one, I'd say that my favorite character is Ivan Martin. I mean, it has to be, right?

He is the only one given a solid journey, aswell as character depth outside of some superficial stuff. His development from an ambitious singer to a power-hungry, fame-seeking, drug-trade-controlling killer is unexpected and honestly pretty exciting to watch. Kinda reminded me of a villain origin story, or (as I mentioned previously) some of Martin Scorcese's early projects, like Taxi Driver or The King Of Comedy. Also, his music is great.

Would I recommend this film? Of course! I literally did right after we finished watching this in class to some of my other classmates in the lunch-break. It's not only an important piece of film/Jamaican history, but an exciting as hell film on it's own right. It deserves to be seen by every film fan just to see how they'll react to it's endless madness. But it also has a lot to say about Jaimaican culture at the time, which takes us to our last point...

This film in dense in content, and it only gets more substantial as we start considering how it reflects some of Jamaica's collective consciousness in a post-colonial world. Yeah, it showcases the state of poverty and dependency most of the country suffered from, but it also puts their search for identity and righteousness in the limelight. As the titular reggae track states, they wanna take back what is theirs, what was stolen from them by the colony. A powerful sentiment that can be translated to violent action; exactly what Ivan Martin ends up doing on his own, demented way.