From Eur Web

Paramount Pictures and director John Singleton have reached a settlement to end litigation stemming from a 2005 deal for the breakout hit “Hustle and Flow,” according to The Hollywood Reporter.

THR’s Eriq Gardner reports:

Singleton sued Paramount and MTV Films in October 2011, originally claiming he was owed at least $20 million for alleged breaches of contract and fraud.

Read more at EurWeb.com.

Jody, Jody, Jody. Though he had some super triflin’ ways, we couldn’t completely rule him out. Perhaps because we saw how he shut ole girl down, though she was doing her best to seduce him. Or more likely, we liked him because he reminded us of a manchild we’ve known (or still know) in our own lives. Either way, watching Jody grow up throughout the course of the movie Baby Boy, was so real and so entertaining and the very talented cast, helped to bring this already relateable story to life. You know the plot, the outcome and those memorable characters; but we bet you don’t know the behind the scenes secrets of this hood classic.

Source: tumblr.com

Tupac was supposed to play the role of Jody

Though anyone can see why Tupac would have been great for this role, it’s still  a bit eery to think that he was supposed to portray Jody. The role was written specifically for him. But when he died in 1996, Singleton shelved the project. The role probably wouldn’t have been too much of a stretch for the rapper turned actor considering he vacillated between the sensitive, socially conscious poet to the thugged out gangster rapper. So the inclusion of Tupac’s face looming over Jody is no coincidence. In a review of the film, the New York Times pointed out just how powerful and symbolic that mural was: “His image, hovering behind Jody and Melvin, is a haunting reminder of what is at stake for Jody.”

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Source: ivewatchedit.com

I have just  five words for you: “You wanna smell my punani?” That line alone was enough to make Poetic Justice a classic piece of art. But aside from the raunch, this movie was much more than the critics initially gave it credit for. John Singleton said he wanted to tell the story of how black women in South Central were affected by the way the black men in their lives were dying. He also wanted to show how the characters open up and reveal their true selves when they’re away from the pressures of the city. Some of us loved it, some of us were disappointed and some of us didn’t appreciate it until it came out on DVD. Either way, you have a lot to learn about this one. Check out some of the facts behind the film.

Source: Bet.com

Janet…or her people Didn’t Think Pac was “Clean” 

Janet Jackson must have assumed Tupac was living some type of wild lifestyle because she didn’t mind asking him to take an AIDS test. Even though there were no sex scenes between the two. They just kissed. That move really showed how ignorant Janet and countless others were about the disease back in the day. A person with AIDS would either have to exchange a gallon of saliva with another person or have opening cuts in their mouth to transfer the disease to another individual. Apparently Janet didn’t know all that. She requested it but Tupac refused. Good man. Janet wasn’t feeling Tupac at all actually. He thought the two would remain friends after filming was complete. I’m going to let Tupac explain what happened.

Source: ditcradio.com

If there’s anything we can learn from the making of “Boyz N The Hood,” it’s that you should never underestimate a person with a dream. Singleton was fresh out of college when he was shopping the script for this film around. Hollywood tried to get over on him since he was a newbie, but the man, though young, was no fool. Looking at all the odds John Singleton had stacked up against him, it’s amazing that his film was made and that it became such a commercial and cultural success. The movie, that only cost around $6 million to produce, eventually earned $60 million during its run in the box office, earning the young director a million dollar bonus.  Singleton has described the film as a “time capsule of what Los Angeles was 20 years ago.” The fact that this movie is still lauded as a classic, 21 years later, just goes to show you how smart and powerful this film was and how right Singleton was in his assessment.

It’s been 20 years since Boyz N The Hood hit the big screen and completely changed our collective expectations of Black film and its place in Hollywood. The writer, producer and director of the film, John Singleton, was only 22 when he made the film and at 24, he became the youngest and first African-American to receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Director.

When Singleton emerged, only one other Black filmmaker was a household name (Spike Lee). Today, there are only a few more that can command the power to get a film greenlit including Antoine Fuqua and Tyler Perry.

Although Boyz N The Hood was his most critical film, Singleton has continued to make strides and has had a pretty illustrious career. Here, in honor of the anniversary of his debut film, we highlight a few of his other notable moments.

When Spike Lee named his production company 40 Acres and a Mule he meant to make a statement about American injustice and one of its worse offenders, Hollywood.  But if you stop there, you miss the bigger point, which is, wait on the mainstream decision makers at your own peril.  The day where they recognize the worth of our stories and our talent for telling them is not coming. Understanding this, filmmaker Ava Duvernay recently launched the African American Film Releasing Movement. Aligned with the black film festival circuit, she’s coordinating same-day, multi-city theatrical releases without any help from Hollywood.

Inspired by the do-it-yourself  approach, TAP picks up on the theme and imagines a studio as big and powerful as DreamWorks Pictures guided by the sensibilities of black people.  Much as Stephen Speilberg and fellow media moguls Jeffrey Katzenberg and David Geffen pooled their resources and made movie making history, we envision a similar scenario for Black Hollywood with Oprah, Jay-Z and Will Smith as primary investors and other imaginative creators and talent nurturing movie making magic and running the day-to-day operations. Did Spike Lee make the cut? Of course he did. Can you guess who else?

Oprah

Co-Founder

Do we have to start with Oprah?  Aren’t folks always begging her for money?  Let’s see, we’re talking bankrolling a studio that could truly shift the game for black film.  Of colored folks with deep pockets Oprah has the strongest track record of backing works by and about black people.  We still have concerns about “Precious”, but against the backdrop of productions based on the work of Alice Walker, Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison, and the forthcoming adaptation of Lynn Nottage’s play, “Ruined”, we can forgive and soon enough, forget.  Knowing how chummy she is with Tyler Perry we’ll need to be explicit about excluding him.  That shouldn’t be too difficult given that he just signed on with Lionsgate for another three years.