I am almost entirely unfamiliar with Tupac Shakur’s discography, but I can personally vouch for the quality of his performances in the half-dozen films in which he starred. This black comedy romp places near the top. Spend New Year’s Day with a trio of junkies — Spoon (Tupac Shakur), Stretch (Tim Roth) and Cookie (Thandie Newton) — as they fight to keep the latter alive after a heroin overdose puts a crimp in the celebration. (The three have reached that point in a junkie’s life where they no longer get high, but must shoot up just to avoid getting sick.) Spoon’s resolution to convince a reluctant Stretch to spend January 1 getting clean results in the two butting heads with bureaucracy, the cops, and a well-dressed lawbreaker (played by writer-director Vondie Curtis-Hall) who doesn’t cotton to finding a brick in the box where the illegal camcorder Stretch sold him should have been. Roth is superb, bouncing comic relief off Shakur’s urbane shooter. As dope addict comedies go, Curtis-Hall’s semi-autobiographical escapades far outclass those in Trainspotting. There is one rule that the filmmakers should not have followed: If you introduce Howard Hesseman in the first act, in the second or third act he absolutely must go off. Other than that, this has the makings a great double-bill with 48 Hrs.. (1997) — Scott Marks
This movie is not currently in theaters.