The film continues to haunt us as we confront some of the most uncomfortable truths about America’s urban ills.
“Went into the store just to get a beer, came out an accessory to murder and armed robbery. It’s funny like that in the hood sometimes. You never knew what was going to happpen. Or when.” – Caine
This weekend marks the 25th anniversary of Menace II Society, the Hughes Brothers’ remarkable 1993 directorial debut that takes us inside the vicious fatalism of the world inhabited by the film’s main character, Kaydee “Caine” Lawson.
From the very opening scene, where Caine and his best friend O-Dog stop into a Korean grocery store to buy some beer, the film pulsates with a nervous energy that’s both infectious and startling. At the outset, the drama wastes no time in inserting the viewer into a world where senseless violence and death permeates the atmosphere.
Once the Korean grocer makes a fatal mistake by looking at O-Dog with disdain and stating, “I feel sorry for your mother,” the resulting series of events set the stage for a piece of visual and cinematic storytelling that remains a masterpiece.
What should have been a simple trip to the store quickly explodes into two murders simply because, in their brief and tragic interaction, the participants can’t summon the empathy to see one another as human beings. And the resulting carnage sets the stage for a maddening examination of what the Caine’s of the world have to navigate at such a young age, and the warped values they unknowingly digest that push and box them into a marginalized existence.
