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'Get Rich' tells moving story with little emotional appeal
MPAA rating: R
Michael Machosky can be reached via e-mail or at 412-320-7901.
50 Cent battled his way up from the hardest streets of NYC, by slinging slurred, merciless murder raps and picking fights with more established artists. He acquired nine bullet holes in his body. Between his music and the drug trade, there's (barely) one degree of separation.
In one of the strangest director/concept pairings of all time, six-time Oscar-nominated director Jim Sheridan ("My Left Foot"), arguably Ireland's greatest director, took it on.
Unlike Curtis Hanson, who directed Eminem in "8 Mile," Sheridan seems unsure what to do with the music. So we get only fleeting glimpses into what it is, how it's made, and the acrid ferment of poverty and desperation that gives it life.
We do get a "Scarface"-like story about rising through the ranks as a drug dealer. Like the songs, it's long on the cash and cars, and short on the crackheads. The love story, though, seems extraneous. Only Terrence Howard, as his manager, sticks out in the supporting cast.
Jackson, playing himself in his own life story, seems strangely detached from it all. His emotional repertoire appears limited to smiling and not smiling, although getting shot through the face -- in the film and real life -- might have something to do with that.
