Had tickets to see this in 35mm back in the fall but couldn't make it for reasons I completely forget. Having finally seen it I can now say I definitely wouldn't have forgotten about that night if I ended up going. I've never seen lights used like this before, felt like I was discovering a whole new way of making movies.

Anyone who says the only noteworthy part of this film are the first 10 minutes (don't get me wrong, great opening) hasn’t seen the last 10 minutes.

"born by myself, die by myself."

remixes a decade of american crime cinema (including ferrara, de palma and bill duke) with a form of experimental hip hop expressionism. a blaxploitation purification story told in idiosyncratic compositions drenched in passionate colors and sudden, incomprehensible explosions of violence. doesn't care about narrative coherency as much as it cares about capturing the intense feelings of its dark, oppressive environment; an entire network of pressure and isolation and brutality that only ever gives you illusion of individual choice/power. DMX plays it exactly right, all self-assured authority until it's hollowed out and crushed and offered a chance to rebuild. don't know what i was expecting when i turned this on but i did not expect to be thinking about takeshi kitano or seijun suzuki. it's a crime that hype williams didn't get to develop this style further and that DMX didn't get to act in more movies than he did. RIP to a king

Superb blaxploitation with the additional jolt of having metabolized 20 years of crime films and rap videos, constantly placing you as a secret observer in a culture simultaneously of everyday detail and almost apocalyptic weirdness. This thing will zip from an empty project concrete basketball court on a freezing morning to a plantation-like mansion under assault by an acrobatic female assassin that looks like Tina Turner in THUNDERDOME crossed with a luchador. Visually this is literally slathered in blackness, teasing information out of ultra-dark environments lit by infrared or bursts of gunfire. Strange and powerful.

The Suspiria of 90s hood movies.

“Black literature is taught as sociology, as
tolerance, not as a serious, rigorous art form.”
- Toni Morrison

After a Kubrick-on-speed diamond heist at a neon-blacklit strip club, Nas walks into DMX's crib, turns on the plasma TV and confusedly watches GUMMO as DMX angrily plays billiards by himself, frustrated that his cohort isn't appreciating the movie.

These are the first 7 minutes of BELLY.

convinced the 16% rotten tomatoes was racially charged

As soon as Gummo came on in the first 10minutes i knew i was in for something special

How the hell is this the only feature film Hype Williams has gotten to direct in his 30 year career? This was incredible!

Takes completely rote gangster (or gangsta in this case) drama and elevates it to god-dream status with style so thick you feel woozy just looking at it for too long.

Gunna’s favorite film

The story was mid, the focus was more on lighting and visuals than anything else and it truly exceeds in that department

How this shit look so good but make zero sense. 

Nas talking bout plane tickets to Africa... man shut up.

completely fluid and fluent in what appears to be its own rarefied universe. a visual language thats completely smoked from hip-hop music videos and album promos. red hot blues against black bodies, night-grain and windowcurtain shadows, death by a thousand fade-cuts.
its probably, very possibly the closest the 90s ever got to a true artistic blaxploitation in that its plot, acting, writing and style are so amorphous that its literally a 90s neon-crime gallery piece. hung up and admired, barely understood. fractured and paranoia is harmonized with the soundtrack and photography as the thing goes on.
also the ending, resting on rapturous and elegiac, feels like everything about Belly is done to completely undermine the raw tragedy of alot of 90s black crime films and use them as stepping stones to heaven.

i think? this is absolutely amazing?

"The world is now feeling the heat from flames it has kept burning since the beginning of civilization. You represent that fire."

One of the most genuine, heartfelt, and introspective looks at self-improvement out there set to some of the most beautiful cinematography I've ever laid eyes on. This is what happens when black creatives get the resources and control that they need. Please, let it happen more often.

Less of a film and more of an experience.

What if Stanley Kubrick made a feature length, late90s R&B video?

DMX, Nas, and Wee-Bey hang out and watch Gummo. The Citizen Kane of late 90’s gangster flicks.

RIP DMX
This movie is great for cinematography and great acting from dmx RIP.

Pretty much unwatchable

well that was amazing 

Nas and DMX aren’t even bad actors 

very interesting plot, strong experimentation in tonal development and variation, use of colour and music compliments this 

plays out in an interesting way, sympathy for characters feels earned and necessary, the way the world collapses, rebuilds itself, collapses again, etc around them is so interesting