Bones

Directed by Ernest Dickerson

(Snoop Dogg, Pam Grier, Khalil Kain, Ricky Harris)

R

While one can’t be sure whether it is specifically for his “G’s” or for his “hustler,” one can be sure of whom Snoop Dogg’s latest film Bones is not partial towards: suburban white kids.

Ironically, it will be these same white kids plunking down their parent’s money that will account for a good portion of the box office take for the film, as they have accounted for a good portion of his album sales in the past.

The irony is not lost on director Ernest Dickerson who, from the very opening scene of the film, takes every opportunity to show us that “white folks don’t belong in black neighborhoods.”

The film opens with a couple of white frat boys from the state college who try to score some drugs in the ghetto, and presciently say things like, “Let me go on the record Jason, this is a really bad idea.”

The pair ultimately winds up disemboweled by the ghost of the film’s titular character Jimmy Bones, a wronged ghetto superstar whose spirit is seeking revenge.

On the other hand, the two black guys that sell them the drugs, who say things like, “Bounce mutha fucka,” and “a’ight den,” survive, and even make off with a brand new sports car for their trouble.

From the grossly stereotypical characters in the opening scene on, the film seems to be a thinly veiled endorsement for racial segregation. Two of the “bad guys” in the film are black men sexually involved with white women. Does the film claim that evil begets interracial dating, or does interracial dating beget evil?

The point is driven home as seconds before one of the men is decapitated, he looks admiringly at his white, blonde-haired girlfriend and brags, “I fooled around and got me a Marilyn Monroe lookin’ white girl.” His subsequent death assumes an air of righteousness, as if dating out of his ethnicity is the final straw that will allow the audience to stomach the murder.

In case the point wasn’t obvious enough, the film also introduces a character named Maurice, a mulatto who claims to exemplify Dr. King’s dream of various races joining hands in solidarity. “I just gotta hold my own hand,” he jokes.

After the film makes a big deal about his multi-ethnic heritage, Maurice is promptly eaten alive by a rabid hound of hell. The dog must have had a powerful thirst for strictly mixed blood.

Disregarding the film’s not so subtle racism, Bones still falls flat due to its painfully predictable plot, essentially a ghettoized version of Nightmare on Elm Street. This, coupled with the film’s pitiful attempts at introducing new catch phrase’s into the lexicon of slang (a fatigued DJ laments, “I need a break, man, I’m getting vinyl spininitus, ha-ha”) make Bones the winter’s first must miss. This film is shiznit, yo, with no “the.”

-Christopher Yocum

Bones is currently open in theaters nationwide.