Column:

Biopic 'Notorious' just pathetic hero worship

This might as well have been a Vh1 special.

By Patrick Daugherty

Published Jan. 29, 2009

If you've ever thought of buying a ShamWow or Billy Mays' Big City Slider Station, you may have considered seeing "Notorious."

Like these famed late-night infomercial products, George Tillman Jr.'s Notorious B.I.G. biopic is an extraneous and wholly unnecessary affair. Just like the urge to buy a ShamWow, entertaining the thought of seeing it should come only as a result of a total bankruptcy of ideas as to what to do with one's free time.

This is not necessarily because "Notorious" is patently awful -- which it is -- but because anyone who doesn't already know the tragic story of one of rap's most famous emcees has either been living in Afghanistan for the past 15 years or is too young to get into the theater.

Basically, Biggie is still too fresh in anyone's mind for anyone to give a damn about "Notorious." For a movie about current or recent events to be successful, it has to either to take a stark, raw look at things (like "United 93") or come from a completely screwball perspective (like "W.").

"Notorious" does neither.

Instead of presenting a fresh take on Biggie's life, or at least offering up a new theory on who shot him, it rehashes what any self-respecting pop-culture junkie has already seen on a thousand different Vh1 specials.
It does, however, engage in a shameless hero worship of a flawed, but deceased figure in recent memory. Few films have gone further down the "he's dead, so let's canonize him" road than "Notorious."

Biggie is portrayed throughout as a visionary saint eager to rise above the thuggery and violence of his time. Problem is, there's little to suggest he actually did this while he was alive.

"Notorious" also accomplishes the difficult task of making one of most respected and intimidating emcees of all time come across as kind of a nerd. There's nothing to fear, or be in awe of, from Jamal Woolard's B.I.G. the whole time he's on screen.

Woolard certainly has the hypnotizing girth to portray Biggie, but not the attitude. His casting is akin to Hayden Christensen's in the latter day "Star Wars" movies -- a green kid playing an American legend, only without any gusto or attempt to remove us from our comfort zones. There's no menace in his glare or bite in his rhymes. He's more eager not to screw up his big chance rather than turn in an indelible performance.

The rest of the movie is marred by actors who look and sound nothing like their real life counterparts (Diddy, Biggie's mother), with bland, sentimental dialogue and enough hero worship to nauseate even the most indiscriminate of movie viewers.

Startlingly limp, "Notorious" offers nothing new for those already familiar with Biggie's life story, nor anything exciting enough to create interest in his saga for those who aren't.

Biggie's life and legacy are treated with kid gloves, and as a result, so are the viewers.