Synopsis
At a sexy, sizzling nightclub, pianist Percival lives life by the rules, while Rooster, the club's flashy lead performer, struts his stuff on the stage. But all changes when greed, fame and murder threaten to destroy them and the joint.
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Cast
- André 3000Percival
- Big BoiRooster
- Paula PattonAngel
- Terrence HowardTrumpy
- Faizon LoveAce
- Malinda WilliamsZora
- Cicely TysonMother Hopkins
- Macy GrayTaffy
- Ben VereenPercy Senior
- Bruce BruceNathan
Recommendations
- 91
Entertainment Weekly
Idlewild is a romp, a ticket to rowdy good times. - 70
Variety
Achieves magic--something sorely missing from so many movies these days--and does so via a philosophy of respect, but not reverence, for what's come before it; it never recycles, it just reimagines. - 70
Village Voice
Idlewild has a sober, loving respect for history and the old South, and thereby grants itself a measure of distinction. - 63
ReelViews
Despite the best efforts of Barber the director, he never quite overcomes the shortcomings of Barber the writer. - 50
Rolling Stone
This oddball mix of "The Cotton Club" and "Six Feet Under" is a big, beautiful mess. But it offers the not-uninstructive spectacle of talented people stumbling over large and unwieldy ambitions. - 50
The Hollywood Reporter
An entertaining mess. It blends together musical styles and dances, historical periods with howling anachronisms, coy, almost childish gimmicks with R-rated sex and violence. - 50
Los Angeles Times
Patton and Benjamin can both hold the screen and are great in their musical sequences, but sorry, they aren't actors -- Terrence Howard, as the villain Trumpy, blows them into dust when he's on camera -- and their limited expressiveness detracts from the film's hallucinatory edge. The plot fails them too, as it takes turns we've seen in a dozen melodramas. - 50
L.A. Weekly
The film only rarely harnesses the power of the anachronistic, funk-driven, beat-heavy rap music that swells its soundtrack. Even the intricately choreographed crowd dance scenes, filled with frenzied movement, are more often stillborn than stimulating.
