What Up? DVD Review

By Kam Williams

Jive Janitors on Run from Mob in Crass Crime Comedy

Tyrone (Kadeem Hardison) and Jerome (Godfrey Danchimah, Jr.) are jive janitors with not much ambition beyond getting "a Hummer and some honeys." Proud to hail from the 'hood, they'll tell any female who gives them the time of day that "We're strong black men. The ghetto is our garden. This is where we get our energy." And the women who serve as their sexual conquests, too.

On a typical you day you might find Tyrone fantasizing about sleeping with a midget while Jerome tries to impress a pedestrian by telling her the cart he's driving down the sidewalk to collect trash is actually a Porsche. In the evenings, the ever-aroused pals frequent a strip club where one get girls' phone numbers by passing himself off as movie director Spike Leroy.

These irritating nitwits think their ship has finally come in the day they find a briefcase with $100,000 in cash on the roof a building where they're working. Thinking themselves now rich enough to retire, they immediately quit their jobs, but quickly blow the loot on a flashy car and "bitches." Only after their new auto is carjacked and they're down to their last $2.14 do they learn that the money belonged to the Mafia and that a vicious mobster named Mr. Spaghetti (Sonny Bermudez) is hot on their trail.

What to do? What to do? The best ideas they can come up with is to rob a black-owned bank and to try to sell soiled panties for $500 by passing them off as stained with Hale Berry's booty juice? No, I am not making this up, but Dominique James who makes a disgraceful scriptwriting debut as the creator of the storyline of What Up?

This insult to the intelligence features the embarrassing antics of a couple of shiftless fools who attempt to resurrect every ugly stereotype about brothers while spouting ebonics-laden dialogue reminiscent of Amos & Andy. Makes Soul Plane look like The Great Debaters.

Poor (0 stars)
Rated R for profanity, sexual references and mature themes.
Running time: 82 minutes
Studio: Lions Gate Home Entertainment

To see a trailer of What Up? Visit: http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi971440409/