Don't Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood MPAA Rating: R Entertainment: +1 Content: -3

This film satirizes stereotypes presented in the "growin' up in the ghetto" movies like Boyz in the Hood and Menace to Society. Ashtray (Shawn Wayans) is dropped off at his father's house in the 'hood to learn about being a man. Ashtray joins his old friend, Loc Dog (Marlon Wayans), to tour the neighborhood. At a party he meets Dasheeki (Tracey Cherelle Jones) and after a brief encounter decides to leave the 'hood when she does. The rest of the film is really a series of sketches taken from various films like Poetic Justice, Juice, Higher Learning, and Dead Presidents exaggerated for comic effect. If you've seen the original films, this parody may have some humor, but it's well hidden.

Like those it strives to parody, DON'T BE A MENACE is loaded with crude and obscene language. Playing on the stereotypes, the only liquid refreshment seems to be 2-liter bottles of beer and the only discussions involve sexual references. At a party, while most are dancing sensually, one couple is naked, having sex. One prolonged scene shows Dasheeki and Ashtray pouring food on each other to eat. Loc Dog picks up a girl at a party who later turns literally into a sexual demon. Perhaps the most offensive scene satirizes a church service where the preacher makes sexually suggestive comments in his sermon, and "dancing in the spirit" becomes a break dance competition that includes a grandmother who smokes dope, drives a low-rider and carries guns. While the violence is moderate rather than graphic, there are still numerous shootings, a beating, and humorous "carjackings" of an ice cream truck and an elderly lady's walker. Drugs are frequently spoofed as what looks like drug making becomes a cake and grandma's marijuana cigarette is cigar size. With no positive role models, filthy language, and crude sexual content, DON'T BE A MENACE is a waste of time and money.

Preview Reviewer: Paul Bicking
Distributor: Miramax Films, 18 E. 48th St., NY, NY 10017