It's an interesting argument, but the message unfortunately gets lost and falls short amidst exaggerated sexuality and a bland plot.
Jody (Tyrese Gibson) is a 20-year-old thug with a dream to succeed in self-employment, but who still lives with his mama, Juanita (A.J. Johnson).
As a habitual player in the 'game of women,' Jody has two toddler children with two different mothers: Yvette (Taraji Henson) and Peanut (Tamara LaSeon Bass). At the same time, he feels the need to continue to sleep around. As the movie plays out, you are bombarded with the proposition that Jody is, as the title suggests, truly a baby boy as he is forced to deal with difficult and sometimes confrontational situations.
The plot is acted out much like a ghetto soap opera, except without all of the captivating twists and turns for which real soap operas are known. There are no areas of suspense in the entire movie, which makes a pillow and a good book almost necessary theater materials for this anti-thriller.
The plot was a straight shot from beginning to end without any subplots or redundancies. It focused mainly on the sex-centric relationship between Jody and his first 'baby mama,' Yvette. This psuedo-romance ended up being dry and virtually emotionless, while the substandard acting dragged it down even further.
Apparently, the film chose to value sex above acting. 'Baby Boy' is so sexually charged that one might feel embarrassed to be watching such graphic depictions of sex - many of which seem to come right from some tacky porn - with other moviegoers in the same room.
And all the sex, like most of the movie, fails to stimulate. Ultimately, 'Baby Boy' is a simple 'Boyz in the Hood' love story gone wrong that loses its capacity for interest after the first half-hour and continues to wander into pointlessness throughout the remainder of the film.
A more meaningful love story is one of the many ways the film could recover. But the relationship between Jody and the girl he supposedly loves, Yvette, is not convincing enough to make the audience care, simultaneously creating a similar feeling toward the whole movie - the inability to care less.
Adrial Dale can be reached at adrial@email.unc.edu.
