The celebrated, contradictory, fast-paced, and short life of a hip-hop firebrand is sadly turned here into a pedestrian, unadventurous biopic. Among similar fare, it falls incredibly short of not just Straight Outta Compton, a close-to-perfect and highly crowd-pleasing blend of cinematic flair and social commentary, but even the modestly entertaining and largely respectful Notorious. It is not a film of grievous sins so much as it is simply a boring one. Excepting a trite prison-interview framing device, it starts at the beginning of its subject's life and moves in a dutiful way from event to event to event, the cinematic equivalent of a Wikipedia article. Characters often converse in platitudes or as if they are aware they are in a biopic of an iconic figure. "I'm going to be a revolutionary!" chirps child 2Pac. He is shown hesitating multiple times before leaving the hotel the night of his murder in Las Vegas in one of those artificial moments meant to evoke calls of, "No! Turn around! Stop!" among the audience. Extensive lip service is paid to police brutality, poverty, and whether 2Pac can be a positive influence even while frequently embracing a hyper-masculine outlaw archetype, but the film's portrayal of urban life in the 1980s and '90s is unconvincing; it feels cheaply produced on a sound-stage and out-of-touch with reality in any visceral or tactile sense of the word. And I am honestly not sure how well it serves its subject in regard to either flattery or constructive criticism and reflection; Demetrius Shipp Jr. resembles 2Pac, but he does not deliver a particularly charismatic or dynamic performance. And the film is curiously disinterested in his actual music (songwriting, life on the road, designing cover art and music videos); it favors the fame created by the art to the art itself and almost plays as the story of a well-known young man who spent money, fought, had sex, went to prison, had more sex, fought again, and died abruptly...and every now and then dropped into a studio to rapidly, effortlessly record a verse, no big deal. There are a few other, rather predictable sour spots, too: the female characters can be sorted into the Matriarch, the Angelic Love Interest, and bitches to be ogled by the camera (this is particularly uncomfortable during the film's hyper-sympathetic dramatization of a rape case). Oh, and there is a fair bit of bad lip-syncing.

C

Also, the movie move so fast at times, events don't have the proper impact or sense of import. It feels as if Tupac transitions from impoverished high-school student to Digital Underground rapper in 5 minutes. And this doesn't create a feeling of, "Oh, wow, what a whirlwind of overnight success due to natural talent!" so much as just...this movie sure is cramming a lot in, and it is not allowing any scene breathing room.

Its handling of his rape case feels borderline grotesque. Based on nothing more than belief in the Great Man, it truly character assassinates the young woman who accused Tupac and his entourage of rape in the hotel. Every single shot of her either emphasizes: a) she is "loose," or b) she is clearly lying and savoring the sight of poor martyr-god Tupac being wrongly convicted.

His mother excepted (the film squeezes her for melodrama), a lot of the peripheral characters are so poorly developed as to be interchangeable unless the name is recognizable: Suge Knight, Jada Pinkett, Dr. Dre, a hilariously unconvincing Snoop Dogg, the Notorious B.I.G. (played by the same actor as in Notorious, and he does have the role down pat)...

Where to start.....

Take 2000's Tupac Resurrection documentry, find the best look-a-like, act out scene for scene, and provide no context or drive behind the legend. This film was the exact opposite of the great S.O.C. from a couple of years ago.

We are only given brief glimpses of his life in between a couple of seconds of music every few minutes. We get no real reason why he was great and not just some knuckle headed kid trying to act gangster when called out or pushed by his agitators. When the final act takes place you would think that you would feel some sense of sorrow or dread but I felt nothing.

I think if the would have just slowed down fleshed out his childhood, show some of the inner working of crafting some of his best songs. and maybe added another hour to the film it would have allowed them to tell a complete story.

Last but not least who in the hell decided that lip syncing not only the songs throughout the film but in one of the most jarring things I've heard in a movie with the dubbing of Snoop's actor with the real rappers voice??? it may work on animated/and or CGI features but live action should never be used to replace the actor voice.

D

Such a disappointing waste of potential. After the greatness that was SOC I thought we would be getting more awesome Biopics, but this film doesn't even mange to be as good as the Notorious movie from 2009. It's basically just a highlight reel of all the big moments of Tupac's life, but it has so cohesive flow or energy. The editing in the first half of this film is so awfully jarring that I honestly thought I was going to hate it, but it got somewhat better in the middle section. I wasn't sold on Demetrius Shipp Jr. at first, but as the movie progressed I did think he nailed some of Pac's mannerisms, however he doesn't posses his fiery charisma or the aggression. The lip synching was also pretty terrible at times.

It was cool seeing Jamal Woolard back as Biggie, but he is very underused in this which is a shame considering I thought he was really solid in Notorious, and while I'm aware Danai Gurira can act it was so hard not seeing her do her best impersonation of Viola Davis in Fences. The actors they got to play Suge Knight and Jada Pinkett were close enough, but holy shit was the guy who played Snoop Dogg awful and what the hell were they thinking with that voice over lol?