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PLOT: In a surreal 1930s Georgia, the lives of gangsters and musicians interlaced with kick-ass foot-stompin' results in the U.S. South's most happening juke joint.
Idlewild ain't your grandparent's Hollywood musical.
Easily the most wildly innovative film of the year, despite the dull title, Bryan Barber's dynamo is a fusion musical. It was inspired by hip-hop superstars OutKast.
Writer-director Barber, who cut his teeth on OutKast videos and shows off an astonishing technical virtuosity in his first feature film, takes hip-hop culture and transports it back to the 1930s.
That's when swing, hot jazz and blues ruled in song and dance, at least in hip circles. There are also trace elements of later evolutions, too, including bebop and rhythm & blues, with a whisper of earlier gospel. Everything is stewed into an explosive gumbo that tastes from every era of black American music and dance in the 20th century.
The anachronisms are not an awkward oversight; they are a deliberate plan to turn Idlewild into a surreal, theatrical-like experience on the big screen.
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OutKast co-founders Andre (3000) Benjamin and Antwan (Big Boi) Patton co-star in the twin plots.
Patton's character, Rooster, is lodged right in the middle of a saga about Georgia gangsters whose lives revolve around illegal booze running and Rooster's hot nightclub, The Church.
Benjamin is the son of the town mortician (Ben Vereen) and has followed in the family business. But he writes and plays innovative jazz music on the side and performs at Rooster's club on the sly. Like the real-life OutKasters -- because Barber borrowed from their lives to create their movie characters -- the two are childhood friends.
Benjamin's blossoming love affair with a Lena Horne-like performer (Paula Patton), as well as upheavals in the gangster world, threaten both of them and their friendship.
Meanwhile, because of the club setting, there are song-and-dance scenes galore, exaggerated into a larger-than-life mode as in Moulin Rouge. The acting is also exaggerated to match the theatricality of the musical numbers created with such verve by Broadway genius Hinton Battle.
There is also animation (the engraved rooster on Patton's flask), stutter-step editing (inspired by Jean-Luc Godard), unique slo-mo (to show off dance steps), a dynamic blend of colour and black-and-white (more theatricality) and references to artifacts of African-American culture, such as the movie Cabin In The Sky or the musical legacy of Bessie Smith, Lena Horne and Cab Calloway.
The support cast helps set this ablaze. Among them is Ving Rhames, Oscar nominees Terrence Howard and Cicely Tyson, plus Faizon Love, Macy Gray as a peudo-Bessie and even Patti LaBelle in a too-brief cameo.
The results are enthralling. Who cares if none of it is historically accurate? This is not a documentary, it's an art film with mainstream hip-hop sensibilities.
BOTTOM LINE: Some people might be confused by the anachronisms; others might find the gangster and love story themes too simple, but this jitterbug hip-hop musical is a blast for anyone who loves cultural fusion.
(This film is rated 14-A)