I wanted to like it and I didn't want to go there but the film's pretty much hella racist - like New Jersey drunk uncle wishing there were more whites in the NBA racist.
At one point (spoilers) Patti Cake$' idol, a rapper named OZ, tells Patti Cake$ she is a culture-vulture, not untrue but she never really reconciles with that - weak and maybe racist. And then the film's by far most interesting character, black anarcho-satanist, falls flat to the point of revealing that his name is Bob, his dad is a lawyer and proceeds to pity fuck Patti Cake$; completely reducing all his sage enigmatic mythos to being a black piece of ass to validate sad white girl feelings?? Super weak and also not not racist. Then to top it all off, shitty overtly racist mom o' cakes makes a cameo in the climax ensuring the mutual love between daughter and mother is highlighted through their shared ability to take up space in a music genre that maybe doesn't actually need more shitty white people. Fail, errr racist fail.
As I said initially, I really wanted to like it, but the film never really got to a point where it felt like it was acknowledging just how absurd it truly was nor that it was sending a very confusing message to white girls that want to get in the rap game. The acting was probably better than the writing - straight up.
At one point (spoilers) Patti Cake$' idol, a rapper named OZ, tells Patti Cake$ she is a culture-vulture, not untrue but she never really reconciles with that - weak and maybe racist. And then the film's by far most interesting character, black anarcho-satanist, falls flat to the point of revealing that his name is Bob, his dad is a lawyer and proceeds to pity fuck Patti Cake$; completely reducing all his sage enigmatic mythos to being a black piece of ass to validate sad white girl feelings?? Super weak and also not not racist. Then to top it all off, shitty overtly racist mom o' cakes makes a cameo in the climax ensuring the mutual love between daughter and mother is highlighted through their shared ability to take up space in a music genre that maybe doesn't actually need more shitty white people. Fail, errr racist fail.
As I said initially, I really wanted to like it, but the film never really got to a point where it felt like it was acknowledging just how absurd it truly was nor that it was sending a very confusing message to white girls that want to get in the rap game. The acting was probably better than the writing - straight up.