General, a skilled painter of murals, has just been released from prison after serving time for drug dealing, and he's trying to reconstruct his life and his marriage to the mother of his 10-year-old son. General's older, reprobate brother, Reece, works for a psychotic white drug lord, Yankee. Yankee wants General back in charge, General wants out and from there the conflict escalates.

The second story involves a young boxer, Jordan, who is confronting his latent homosexuality even as several of his ring-mates involve him in some nasty gay-bashing and battery. Jordan is compelled to go along, but he's clearly reluctant to speak out in this violent environment, much less come out.

Still, he does better than Maxine, the window dresser at the heart of the third story. Having had an abortion, she's been dumped by an unseen boyfriend who had used his video camera as a sexual prosthesis. Now he seems to be taking everything from her apartment except for her assorted mannequins. -- Richard Harrington

By Richard Harrington
Washington Post Staff Writer
April 12, 1996

More than a promising debut, Clement Virgo's "Rude" announces the arrival of a director with a distinctly personal, poetic vision. That vision is not yet fully developed, but Virgo's ambition and achievement are powerful enough to compensate for the film's obviously small budget.

Because Virgo is black (Jamaican-born, he moved to Toronto at 11), because he wrote the script and because he's working with a predominantly black cast and crew, he's been compared to Spike Lee and his debut, "She's Gotta Have It."

What they share, however, is less ethnicity than humanity. Virgo's film captures the ebb and flow of events in an inner-city Toronto neighborhood over an Easter weekend, and while one senses the effects of race in some situations, the challenges faced by his protagonists are universal.

Virgo sets himself a stiff challenge by opting to tell three separate tales that unravel and intertwine concurrently. You almost expect a "Bridge of San Luis Rey" finale, but the episodes never actually connect. Instead, Virgo, cinematographer Barry Stone and editor Susan Maggi serve up the scenarios with three subtly distinct cinematic styles, binding them together by means of supple cuts, surreal segues and the butterscotch voice of Rude (Sharon M. Lewis), the pirate deejay whose running commentary serves as a moody adjunct to the soundtrack.

The most fully developed story belongs to General (Maurice Dean Wint, best known here from "Tek War") and Jessica (Melanie Nicholls-King). General, a skilled painter of murals, has just been released from prison after serving time for drug dealing, and he's trying to reconstruct his life and his marriage to the mother of his 10-year-old son (Ashley Brown). It's a process made doubly difficult by General's stubborn pride and fiscal frustration ("What am I going to give my son when he's a man?") and Jessica's straight and narrow morality (she has become a police officer since General's incarceration).

The familial tension is underscored by the presence of General's older, reprobate brother, Reece ("Homicide's" Clark Johnson), who works for a psychotic white drug lord, Yankee (Stephen Shellen). Yankee wants General back in charge, General wants out and from there the conflict escalates.

The second story involves a young boxer, Jordan (Richard Chevolleau), who is confronting his latent homosexuality even as several of his ring-mates involve him in some nasty gay-bashing and battery. Jordan is compelled to go along, but he's clearly reluctant to speak out in this violent environment, much less come out. Because this episode is so thinly sketched, Jordan's epiphany seems somewhat forced and farcical, hardly the terms you'd associate with his situation.

Still, he does better than Maxine (Rachael Crawford), the window dresser at the heart of the third story. Having had an abortion, she's been dumped by an unseen boyfriend who had used his video camera as a sexual prosthesis. Now he seems to be taking everything from her apartment except for assorted dummies (Maxine seems to have better luck with mannequins than men). While we can sense her despair, the context is not developed enough to provoke much compassion.

Virgo filmed his stories in three styles: The major story is told in traditional narrative form, while the boxer's tale is more MTV-kinetic and Maxine's is artily European. That it ultimately hangs together is testimony to the cinematography and editing, to production designer Bill Fleming's elegant manipulation of color and light, and to Lewis's provocative dialogue as the deejay/Greek chorus (a device borrowed from "The Warriors").

"Rude" can't always deliver on Virgo's vision, but it's one hell of an entrance.

Rude is not rated but contains some profanity and violence.