For a film with a title as bombast as "Notorious," the final product is quite the opposite. This much-hyped bio-pic of iconic rapper Notorious B.I.G. (a.k.a. Biggie Smalls, Christopher Wallace) is downright unremarkable save for key newcomer performances.
Meticulously tracking his life from the schoolyard to the graveyard, the film accounts for each trial and tribulation lining B.I.G.'s rocky path to stardom.
Writers Reggie Bythewood and Cheo Coker left no stone unturned, even when said stone did nothing to advance the plot.
Though this approach may have served as a briefing for those unfamiliar with Biggie's life and times, it made the early parts of the movie tedious.
Combined with indiscreet cinematography and director George Tillman Jr.'s apparent love of way-too-close close-ups, the film risked overwhelming the audience with overall heavy-handedness.
Fortunately, the flailing project is rescued from an untimely death by the 300-pound frame of 33-year-old Jamal Woolard, who perfected the swagger and mannerisms of the late rapper in this lead role. In watching the musical interludes where Woolard raps, it is as if Biggie Smalls never left the party that day in March 1997.
Woolard's rich performance is only slightly edged out by those of his love interests. Naturi Naughton raunchily sizzles and sparks as Kim Jones (Lil' Kim), and Antonique Smith plays Wallace's wife, R&B singer Faith Evans.
The film picks up pace as the characters Sean "Puff Daddy" Combs (Derek Luke) and Tupac Shakur (Anthony Mackie) enter the scene. Luke's hyperactive portrayal of the media mogul is unintentionally funny, though more reminiscent of R. Kelly than not.
As for the controversy surrounding Biggie and Shakur's murders, the film takes a decidedly hands-off approach, eschewing any "who-dun-it" speculations, other than absolving Biggie of the 1994 shooting of Shakur at Quad Recording Studios.
In fact, it's hard to find one person in the movie's entirety who isn't portrayed in a favorable light. Like most bio-pics, "Notorious" often gives way to sentimentality and simplification, addressing but glossing over Biggie's indiscretions and infidelities. The script neatly remedies each of his character flaws in phone calls and stale monologues.
Yet in an apt and much-appreciated final stroke of poignancy, "Notorious" concludes with a real-life montage of funeral onlookers dancing to Biggie's music, proving that in spite of the uneven execution of the film, there exists a valid point in making it.
Grade: B-
Verdict: The movie equivalent to Puff Daddy's (a.k.a. P. Diddy, Sean Combs, [insert trivial new nickname]) 1997 hit, "I'll Be Missing You."
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