The Lie: Dr Dre has a well-documented history of violence against women. The film ignores this. Earlier this year, F Gary Gray's NWA biopic Straight Outta Compton became a smash hit both commercially and critically, Tracing the origins, break-up and more recent lives of the core members of the group, the film served as an interesting and incendiary compendium of moments from the careers of true rap pioneers. A quick glance at the film's credits shows that NWA members Ice Cube and Dr Dre were producers on Straight Outta Compton. It is perhaps this nugget of information that explains the film's unforgivable omission of Dr Dre's history of violence against women. In a confrontational and heart-wrenching Gawker article, rapper and TV personality Dee Barnes described her brutal attack at the hands of Dre and mourned the absence of an acknowledgement of the incident in Straight Outta Compton. Dre also abused ex-wife Michel'le, who was entirely absent from the film as well. Given the rather congratulatory nature of Straight Outta Compton, it's understandable from a filmmaking perspective why these moments were not included in the story. However, when shocking physical abuse is dismissed as "side stories", there's clearly some rather huge massaging of the truth at play.
Freelance film journalist and fan of professional wrestling. Usually found in a darkened screening room looking for an aisle seat and telling people to put away their mobile phones. Also known to do a bit of stand-up comedy, so I'm used to the occasional heckle.
