{"id":8959,"date":"2024-11-27T13:01:28","date_gmt":"2024-11-27T18:01:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=8959"},"modified":"2024-11-27T13:01:28","modified_gmt":"2024-11-27T18:01:28","slug":"bones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/11\/27\/bones\/","title":{"rendered":"Bones"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Bones<\/strong> (2001)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 New Line\/Horror\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 96 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence, gore, language, sexuality, drugs)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Ernest Dickerson\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Adam Simon and Tim Metcalfe\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Elia Cmiral\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Flavio Labiano\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: October 26, 2001 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Snoop Dogg, Pam Grier, Michael T. Weiss, Clifton Powell, Ricky Harris, Bianca Lawson, Khalil Kain, Merwin Mondesir, Sean Amsing, Katharine Isabelle, Ronald Selmour, Deezer D, Garikayi Mutambirwa, Erin Wright, Lynda Boyd, Josh Byer, Kirby Morrow.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $7.3M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ** \u00bd<\/p>\n

\u00a0It was a good idea…. on paper anyway. A murdered 70s gangster rises from his grave inside an abandoned building to exact his revenge against his killers. This is the premise of the horror movie Bones<\/strong> and it should have been great, especially with rapper Snoop Dogg and blaxploitation legend Pam Grier in it. Alas, it\u2019s not. It suffers greatly from weak characters, an inconsistent tone and a slow start. It doesn\u2019t really get going until Jimmy Bones returns from the dead about an hour into the movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In 1979, Jimmy Bones (Snoop Dogg) was a well-respected figure in his neighborhood despite being a criminal. He genuinely cared about his people, acting as their protector against drug dealers that want to sell their product on his turf. When he refuses to do business with dealer Eddie Mack (Harris, Tales from the Hood) and corrupt cop Lupovich (Weiss, Freeway), they kill him and bury him in the basement of his own home which then sits vacant for the next two decades while the surrounding neighborhood falls into ruin.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Cut to present-day 2001 when a group of young wannabe entrepreneurs- Patrick (Kain, Juice), little brother Bill (Mondesir, Grave Encounters), best friend Maurice (Amsing) and stepsister Tia (Isabelle, Freddy vs. Jason)- buy Bones\u2019 old brownstone with the intention of opening a nightclub. It\u2019s a bad idea and everybody knows it except these dumb ass kids. Jimmy\u2019s old girlfriend Pearl (Grier, Jackie Brown) still lives in the neighborhood with her daughter Cynthia (Lawson, Save the Last Dance). A psychic, she tries to warn them off to no avail. When Patrick\u2019s father Jeremiah (Powell, Ray) learns of his son\u2019s new business venture, he flips out. A former associate of Jimmy Bones, he knows what went down and wants to leave the past right where it is. Despite all the objections and omens (e.g. a big black dog with glowing red eyes), the dummies proceed with their plans.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Like I said, it takes a while for Bones<\/strong> to get to the good stuff. Until then, we\u2019re forced to hang out with some very uninteresting stock characters. Patrick and his posse are boring and one-dimensional. Nothing original happens to them. Predictably, Patrick and Cynthia start a relationship against the wishes of her mother. Yes, she spends the night (well, most of it) in the building with her new friends only to be scared off by a supernatural encounter with Jimmy. These kids are also stupid. They do the same dumb things as the teens in other horror movies, but thinking that they can have the building permit-ready in a few days time on their own (i.e. no contractors) takes stupidity to a new level. Some would call it delusional.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In any event, they throw a big opening night party only to have it ruined by a certain uninvited guest whose arrival is heralded by a maggot shower from the ceiling. Okay, that part is cool even if it is cribbed from Suspiria. This is when Bones <\/strong>hits its stride. After his triumphant return from the hereafter, Jimmy Bones hits the streets to visit his debtors. This should have been the main focus of the plot. This is what Bones<\/strong> should have been about. It would have benefited from less time with the youngsters and more with Jimmy and his associates. Maybe it\u2019s just me, but I felt myself growing impatient as the first hour plodded along. I did like the flashbacks to \u201979 with Jimmy strutting down the street like Huggy Bear with his bad threads and cocksure attitude. When he comes back in \u201901, he\u2019s a perfect mix of cool and evil. Snoop does a great job with the role. He\u2019s easily the best thing about Bones<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Grier is also quite good as the girlfriend who now makes her living as a psychic. She\u2019s attuned to the evil that resides in Jimmy\u2019s derelict brownstone, an imposing structure on a street that makes Skid Row look like a vacation resort. As for the other performances, they tie in to the film\u2019s tonal issues. You see, Bones<\/strong> can\u2019t settle on a consistent tone. It can\u2019t decide whether it wants to be scary or funny and doesn\u2019t wholly succeed at either. It tries to do both resulting in a markedly uneven movie. I honestly didn\u2019t know how to take it. The cast seems to have the same problem. They\u2019re not sure whether to play it straight or not. As such, the performances are all over the map.<\/p>\n

\u00a0On the upside, Bones <\/strong>does boast cool production design and gore effects. I can\u2019t be too hard on a horror movie that features its boogeyman carrying around two talking severed heads. Directed by Ernest Dickerson (Demon Knight), Bones <\/strong>has its good points. Unfortunately, they\u2019re almost outweighed by its flaws. It wants to be fun, but too many times it feels forced. This one could have been great. I envision a film that deftly combines 70s blaxploitation and 80s horror motifs in a new millennium setting. In more assured hands, it would have worked. Sadly, this one is a near miss.\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bones (2001)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 New Line\/Horror\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 96 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence, gore, language, sexuality, drugs)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Ernest Dickerson\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Adam Simon and Tim Metcalfe\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Elia Cmiral\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Flavio Labiano\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: October 26, 2001 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Snoop Dogg, Pam Grier, Michael T. Weiss, Clifton Powell, Ricky Harris, Bianca Lawson, Khalil Kain, Merwin Mondesir, Sean Amsing, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9295,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8959","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-horror"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/Bones-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8959","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8959"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8959\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9297,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8959\/revisions\/9297"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9295"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8959"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8959"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8959"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}