In an early flashback scene, we learn that a pair of neglectful parents raised Caine: his drug-dealer father, Tat Lawson (Samuel L. Credit: New Line Cinema Credit: Jared Cowan Credit: New Line Cinema Credit: Jared Cowan Credit: New Line Cinema Credit: Jared Cowan Ronnie’s House Caine (Tyrin Turner), left, and O-Dog (Larenz Tate) enter the liquor store. The lack of identifying markers makes the corner store difficult to pinpoint, but the film’s location manager, Earl West, directed us to a corner liquor store in Mid-City. The man behind the register, under his breath, insults O-Dog by saying, “I feel sorry for your mother.” O-Dog proceeds to pull out a gun, shoot both owners, take the security tape, and rob the register and the owner’s pockets. All the while, the male owner behind the register is demanding that O-Dog and Caine hurry up, pay for the beer, and leave the store.Īfter paying for the beer and not immediately receiving his change from the register, Caine and O-Dog begin walking out of the store. The female storeowner begins shadowing the two young black men as they approach the beer refrigerator. shot the 15-year-old African-American girl in the head after she was accused of shoplifting a bottle of orange juice, a claim that was later refuted by the police and witnesses.Īs soon as O-Dog and Caine enter the store, suspicion between owners and customers is made abundantly clear. When Caine (Tyrin Turner), the film’s main character, and his impetuous friend O-Dog (Larenz Tate) enter a Korean-American, husband and wife owned liquor store in the opening scene of Menace II Society, it’s hard not to recall the murder of Latasha Harlins. Taco explored and photographed a number of the film’s locations to see how they appear today. Many of the locations including those in Watts itself, Inglewood, Leimert Park, Jefferson Park, and even locations in areas as removed as Long Beach, San Fernando, and Castaic had never been used before in a major motion picture and have not been seen on screen since the theatrical release of Menace II Society, which debuted on May 26, 1993.įor the film’s 25 th anniversary, L.A. County to create the South Central neighborhood of Watts, where the film is largely set. Menace II Society combined locations across L.A. RELATED: Watch TAG, a Short Film About a Young Graffiti Artist On the Run in Los Angeles gave way to the midnight joyrides and luridly lit interiors of Menace. Boyz ’s sun-drenched neighborhood of Cimarron St. riots, Menace was shot about six months after the riots ended. simmering in what was to boil over into the L.A.
Where Dennis Hopper’s Colors (1988) and Singleton’s film were depictions of an L.A. Though comparisons are naturally made between Boyz N the Hood and Menace II Society, the latter might actually be more akin to films that depict a seedy and malevolent nighttime underbelly of Los Angeles like L.A. Menace II Society, about a recent graduate of Jordan High School in Watts who struggles with becoming trapped in the violent gang culture of which a contemptuous society has deemed him fit, is one of the darkest – both figuratively and literally – not only of ‘hood film but also of L.A. Jordan Downs Housing Community in Watts. Credit: Jared Cowan classic, Boyz N the Hood (1991), the Hughes Brothers’ Menace II Society (1993) is one of a handful of films dating back to Melvin Van Peebles’ Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song (1971) and Charles Burnett’s Killer of Sheep (1978) that hasn’t shied from and vividly depicted life in South Los Angeles. Hot on the heels of John Singleton’s L.A. Twenty-five years ago, filmmakers Allen and Albert Hughes burst onto the Hollywood scene with an unflinching, raw, and, at times, brutal portrayal of African-American teenage life in South Central L.A.