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ATL

Roll Bounce with grit
By TOM MEEK  |  April 5, 2006
2.5 2.5 Stars
ATL: Boyz N the Hood goes roller-rink in Atlanta.Rap-video director Chris Robinson revisits Boyz N the Hood, transplanting the parable of African-American youths getting out from LA to hardscrabble Atlanta. Based on a story by Antwone Fisher (yes, him), the film finds Rashad (rapper Tip Harris, a/k/a T.I.) and his younger brother Ant (Evan Ross) living with their deadbeat uncle. Rashad and his posse are Sunday-night dance kings at the local roller rink. (It’s Roll Bounce with grit.) Then he falls for New-New (Lauren London), who’s not all she appears to be, while Ant latches on to a drug dealer (OutKast’s Big Boi) and their posse mate Esquire (Jackie Long) tries to cut connections (playing “Tiger Hood” at the country club) to get into an Ivy. It all hangs on Rashad’s intensity, and even though his emoting is a fixed gear, T.I. holds his own. The whites are all rich and anal, and the concluding revelations feel a bit hatched. But Robinson’s fluid visual style and a bristling soundtrack help atone.
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