I Got a Grip of Thugs!

Marci X (2003)

Rating ... B- (58)

Did Marci X ever have a chance? Tucked away in Paramount's vault for three years before being surreptitiously dumped into theatres during the dog days of 2003, Marci X opened to numerous detractors who detected its bloodscent from miles away. The film suffered undue animosity from critics bemoaning its lack of "seriousness" (read: not actually analogous to lack of meaning) and the public, bored of the stale white-people-acting-black trope, yet in actuality the film is a sunny satire on hip-hop duplicity.

Marci is a Jewish socialite on a mission to clear her father's maligned name. After rapper Dr. S releases a controversial album through a label buried somewhere in the corporate conglomerate her father operates, he's shunned by do-gooder senator Mary Ellen Spinkle, who calls for a boycott.

Marci first visits Dr. S backstage at one of his concerts, where he claims himself and his music to be "keepin' it real" [to the streets where he grew up] yet his laughably masculine act reeks of affectation, replete with self-deification ("the power in my pants") and wealth on display. His connection to the culture he raps for and about is tenuous at best; this conceit is cleverly conveyed through the outlandish costumes Dr. S sports, the best of which is an oversized bling zipper whose teeth are individual bullet casings.

Marci on the other hand is satirized as a well-meaning, upper crust airhead with a similar dilemma. When Dr. S upstages her during the concert and puts her on the spot, she raps about "the power in my purse" - it's a display every bit as self-aggrandizing as that of Dr. S because she raps a similar testament to her own unearned wealth and privilege (evidenced by her mode fashion made possible by daddy's earnings) which is justified by her high-profile, humanitarian displays of gratuity.

Marci X satirizes not only the lavishness of hip-hop in contrast to the lifestyle of the culture it represents, but also the nature of the social messages present within hip-hop. Satirical song titles like "Shoot the Teachers" and "Six Grades Are Plenty" remark on how hip-hop panders to black culture yet displays no desire to better it. The general public responds to what they believe to be obscenity by censure and point to sanitized alternatives, shown in the film as the hilarious Boyz R Us, an N-Sync-esque boy band with "positive" messages about abstinence that are just as out of touch with reality as Marci and her charity dinners for children with esoteric diseases.

This conflict about the explicitness of rap music escalates to a senate hearing where the label is put on trial (spoofing events from the 90's), prompting Marci and Dr. S to argue on hip-hop's behalf. They contend hip-hop to be a method of expressing truths (like any artistic medium), albeit in a manner often too base for consumption. Marci X celebrates the overlap between cultures, whose diversity is lauded as in essence, different ways of saying the same thing.