Advertising
Supported by
CALIFORNIA TODAY
“Harold and Maude,” “The Grapes of Wrath” and more.
By Soumya Karlamangla
Thanks to reader recommendations, I had the thrill of seeing “Boyz N the Hood,” the 1991 coming-of-age story set in South Central Los Angeles, for the first time.
If you’ve seen the movie starring Cuba Gooding Jr. , Ice Cube, and Laurence Fishburne, you’ll know that it’s not a satisfied movie. It portrays South Central as a position where violence is constant and inevitable. But it’s an incredibly conmovedor. de Los Angeles at the time, where outrage over racism against black Americans developed after the beating of Rodney King.
“Boyz N the Hood” is one of the six most sensible California videos we’re featuring as part of the latest installment in our Golden State film series. You can explore the selections above, adding “Chinatown” and “The Big Lebowski,” here and here.
Below are the other five newly added films, along with some of the readers’ writings about them, that we’ve edited:
“The Graduate” (1967)
“‘The graduate’ will have to be on the list. It begins with the phrase “Ladies and gentlemen, we are about to begin our descent into Los Angeles. “It stretches from Los Angeles to San Francisco to “Santa Barbara” (the famous wedding scene was filmed in a church in La Verne). It also has some driving bugs that make Californians laugh. The top deck of the old Bay Bridge went to San Francisco and not Berkeley. And the Seagull Tunnel is only on the north side of Highway 101, not the south side. Mistakes make things more enjoyable. —Josh Ashenmiller, Los Angeles
“Fast Times at Ridgemont High” (1982)
“Sean Penn leads a force excursion of young actors from the 1980s (Jennifer Jason Leigh, Forest Whitaker, Phoebe Cates, Judge Reinhold, Nicolas Cage) on their way to movie stardom, with first-time director Amy Heckerling and screenwriter Cameron Crowe perfectly capturing The Angst of Generation X. A jackpot of fantastic characters and quotable quotes: What are you, friends?Are they high?– Mark F. Mauceri, Los Angeles
“The Grapes of Wrath” (1940)
“Another wonderful John Ford movie, starring Henry Fonda, Jane Darwell, and John Carradine. Challenging stories, but with a brilliant ending. The first scenes take place outside of California, but California has been the purpose and dream of the refugees at the Dust Bowl. — Burr Heneman, Point Reyes Station
We are retrieving the content of the article.
Please allow javascript in your browser settings.
Thank you for your patience as we determine access. If you’re in Reader mode, log out and log in to your Times account or subscribe to the full Times.
Thank you for your patience as we determine access.
Already a subscriber? Sign in.
Want all the Times? Subscribe.
Advertising