Synopsis
Four Harlem friends -- Bishop, Q, Steel and Raheem -- dabble in petty crime, but they decide to go big by knocking off a convenience store. Bishop, the magnetic leader of the group, has the gun. But Q has different aspirations. He wants to be a DJ and happens to have a gig the night of the robbery. Unfortunately for him, Bishop isn't willing to take no for answer in a game where everything's for keeps.
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Cast
- Omar EppsQuincy 'Q' Powell
- Tupac ShakurRoland Bishop
- Khalil KainRaheem Porter
- Jermaine HopkinsSteel
- Samuel L. JacksonTrip
- Queen LatifahRuffhouse M.C.
- Vincent LarescaRadames
- Michael BadaluccoDetective Kelly
- Donald FaisonStudent
- Maggie RushMyra
Recommendations
- 83
Entertainment Weekly
The film is an inflammatory morality play shot through with rage and despair. - 75
Chicago Sun-Times
There is a real terror in the faces of these kids as they realize that people have died, that guns kill, that your life can be ruined, or over, in an instant. - 75
Boston Globe
Juice is a film about choices. The right ones. The tragically wrong ones. There will be comparisons to Matty Rich's brilliant "Straight Out of Brooklyn," but Dickerson's effort is more richly textured, more grounded in an ordinary kid's point of view. And Dickerson's dogged determination to film from that perspective has resulted in a film rich in the right lingo, the right clothes, the right attitudes. [17 Jan 1992, p.67] - 70
The New York Times
The film winds up taking a clear anticrime stance, and Mr. Epps ably conveys Q's trepidation about his friends' behavior. But Juice also revels in the flash, irreverence and tough-guy posturing to which the film's violence can ultimately be traced. - 70
Variety
Dickerson and co-writer Gerard Brown exhibit a sharp ear for dialog and have some real finds in their largely unknown cast. - 67
Austin Chronicle
Dickerson's story of street kids at risk breaks no new ground. It is better than most, but not by much. Sure looks good, though. - 63
USA Today
Dickerson's direction seems more assured as Juice progresses, but by then, the film has become less a dilemma movie than a melodramatically conventional revenge piece. [17 Jan 1992, p.4D] - 60
Los Angeles Times
Though it is a vivid, promising piece of work from first-time director Ernest R. Dickerson, it also shows how difficult it's becoming to deal with this material in any kind of fresh manner.
