I can tell I'm in the minority here, but I was really aggravated after seeing Rize. I was very excited to see the film after hearing so much about the dancing itself and the social impact of clowning and krumping on kids' lives in L.A. I feel like what could have been a very interesting, enlightening film about inner city youth culture turned out to be little more than a poorly cobbled together mish-mash with flashy flourishes that took away from any resounding impact the film could have had. The film had very little idea of narrative flow and jumped around from point to point haphazardly throughout, but especially towards the end which just about falls apart. In Rize, David LaChappelle criticizes contemporary hip-hop for it's exploitative hyper-sexual consumerism, but then proceeds to spend an excruciatingly long stretch of film showcasing close-ups of the glistening Krumpers greased-up bodies in slow-motion. This sequence is reminiscent of countless commercial hip-hop music videos. The point that Clowning and Krumping is the antithesis to this world is undercut by LaChappelle's desire to make Krumping into some kind of Inner City Abercrombie and Fitch commercial. Given LaChappelle's professional background as a visually talented, but intellectually vacuous photographer, I'm personally surprised that anything socially resonant came from this film. I'm apt to attribute any of the considerable energy and vitality in this film to the dancers, their lives, their strength, and their intelligence.
Review of Rize
