"All Eyez on Me" is the biopic on the late and majorly influential rapper, Tupac Shakur. Chronologizing his life and the many events that would lead to his success as well as his untimely death in 1996 at age 25. Now I will get right off the bat that no I am not a fan of gangster rap. It's just not my music genre, however like I said in my review for "Straight Outta Compton" I do have a respect for it and the many people who helped form it; including Tupac Shakur. And unfortunately I feel like the man deserves a much better film based on his life than this.
This is not a bad movie, but it significantly struggles with structure and focus. This movie is trying very hard to cram in as much info on the rap artist rather than picking the pieces it needs to create a solid foundation for an engaging story. There are too many events and subplots that ultimately add to very little by the end, too many characters that come and go for so long I forget that they were in the movie and when they do show up I'm not sure who they even are. I legitimately forgot that Tupac had a sister until he has a discussion with his mother briefly mentioning her about an hour and a half after the sister's last scene in the movie. Another thing, this film is too long and should have been edited down to just two hours if not less than that. There are simply too many subjects that the movie wants to focus on, but it doesn't give enough time to any individual story line or secondary character that it is impossible to really get invested in any of it.
There was a supporting character introduced very early on in the film that was Tupac's best friend and teenage romance before he moved to California from Baltimore. This would have been an interesting relationship to delve more into and really helped humanize Tupac's character even more, but after sharing two scenes together she is entirely taken out of the film until an hour later. Maybe longer than that when they briefly meet up years later, but have supposedly been on speaking terms since him moving away. Then by the end of the film it's as if she wasn't in the movie at all, having practically no impact on the overall story in the slightest. And there are plenty of other examples that occur in the film just like that. In my opinion, either things like that should have been expanded upon to replace the needless fat on the script or cut entirely so it could focus more on the things that actually seemed to matter.
The screenplay doesn't feel like a fluid or cohesive plot, it just feels like a strings of things and scenes happening that never give much impact. To compare this somewhat to 2015's "Straight Outta Compton" that also was a biopic on rappers that dealt with many similar tribulations as Tupac, that film felt as though when the major things happened it wasn't just another thing that the movie would take a couple minutes to gloss over; they were big problems that they faced and had to overcome whether that be with the media, deaths, the government attacking their music, police physically attacking them. All those things happen in both movies, but with "All Eyez On Me" none of it ever gets enough focus in order to connect with. Only feels like yet another thing to just happen and the movie goes along its marry way, while with "Straight Outta Compton" all those themes were thoroughly dealt with in a way that feels like the audience feels the character's aggravation as well.
Another thing, and maybe this is simply personal preference, but how they dealt with Tupac's death just felt so...how do I put this...Hollywoodized? With hardcore foreshadowing that was so on the nose that I just wanted to yell at the screen, "Yes, I get it. He's gonna die. Get on with it." Taking what were supposed to be poignant moments between him and his girlfriend or his mother and just sucking the life out of it so it could basically stop and say, "Hey, he's about to die. He's totally gonna die so you should feel sad right here. Be sad. This is a sad moment ya see because he's gonna die". I don't like a movie treating their audience like idiots and this kind of did that a bit. I'm sorry to keep comparing these two films, but with so many similarities in character and story it's hard not to; but with "Straight Outta Compton" when *SPOILER ALERT* the death of Eazy-E comes to play in the plot, it is a legitimately sad point in the film and it never feels like the screenwriter is setting up moments with Eazy-E and his girlfriend like "Hey girl, I'll be back in just an hour. I promise that nothing bad will ever happen, because it will only be an hour. I swear to you on my life that I'll come back to you" Then have them both standing silently opposite sides of the door as they both contemplate going back or stopping the other before he inevitably goes off to die. Maybe all that actually happened with Tupac, but to me it just felt like a studio note including something I've seen before in other movies.
There are more complaints I have about the film, but I think it's not worth really getting into. I believe Tupac and the people who love his work, deserve a better film than this. A decent try, but maybe tried too hard and needed more focus in the right areas instead of squeezing everything the writers could into a two and a half hour run time.
This is not a bad movie, but it significantly struggles with structure and focus. This movie is trying very hard to cram in as much info on the rap artist rather than picking the pieces it needs to create a solid foundation for an engaging story. There are too many events and subplots that ultimately add to very little by the end, too many characters that come and go for so long I forget that they were in the movie and when they do show up I'm not sure who they even are. I legitimately forgot that Tupac had a sister until he has a discussion with his mother briefly mentioning her about an hour and a half after the sister's last scene in the movie. Another thing, this film is too long and should have been edited down to just two hours if not less than that. There are simply too many subjects that the movie wants to focus on, but it doesn't give enough time to any individual story line or secondary character that it is impossible to really get invested in any of it.
There was a supporting character introduced very early on in the film that was Tupac's best friend and teenage romance before he moved to California from Baltimore. This would have been an interesting relationship to delve more into and really helped humanize Tupac's character even more, but after sharing two scenes together she is entirely taken out of the film until an hour later. Maybe longer than that when they briefly meet up years later, but have supposedly been on speaking terms since him moving away. Then by the end of the film it's as if she wasn't in the movie at all, having practically no impact on the overall story in the slightest. And there are plenty of other examples that occur in the film just like that. In my opinion, either things like that should have been expanded upon to replace the needless fat on the script or cut entirely so it could focus more on the things that actually seemed to matter.
The screenplay doesn't feel like a fluid or cohesive plot, it just feels like a strings of things and scenes happening that never give much impact. To compare this somewhat to 2015's "Straight Outta Compton" that also was a biopic on rappers that dealt with many similar tribulations as Tupac, that film felt as though when the major things happened it wasn't just another thing that the movie would take a couple minutes to gloss over; they were big problems that they faced and had to overcome whether that be with the media, deaths, the government attacking their music, police physically attacking them. All those things happen in both movies, but with "All Eyez On Me" none of it ever gets enough focus in order to connect with. Only feels like yet another thing to just happen and the movie goes along its marry way, while with "Straight Outta Compton" all those themes were thoroughly dealt with in a way that feels like the audience feels the character's aggravation as well.
Another thing, and maybe this is simply personal preference, but how they dealt with Tupac's death just felt so...how do I put this...Hollywoodized? With hardcore foreshadowing that was so on the nose that I just wanted to yell at the screen, "Yes, I get it. He's gonna die. Get on with it." Taking what were supposed to be poignant moments between him and his girlfriend or his mother and just sucking the life out of it so it could basically stop and say, "Hey, he's about to die. He's totally gonna die so you should feel sad right here. Be sad. This is a sad moment ya see because he's gonna die". I don't like a movie treating their audience like idiots and this kind of did that a bit. I'm sorry to keep comparing these two films, but with so many similarities in character and story it's hard not to; but with "Straight Outta Compton" when *SPOILER ALERT* the death of Eazy-E comes to play in the plot, it is a legitimately sad point in the film and it never feels like the screenwriter is setting up moments with Eazy-E and his girlfriend like "Hey girl, I'll be back in just an hour. I promise that nothing bad will ever happen, because it will only be an hour. I swear to you on my life that I'll come back to you" Then have them both standing silently opposite sides of the door as they both contemplate going back or stopping the other before he inevitably goes off to die. Maybe all that actually happened with Tupac, but to me it just felt like a studio note including something I've seen before in other movies.
There are more complaints I have about the film, but I think it's not worth really getting into. I believe Tupac and the people who love his work, deserve a better film than this. A decent try, but maybe tried too hard and needed more focus in the right areas instead of squeezing everything the writers could into a two and a half hour run time.