All About the Benjamins
Length: 1 hour, 34 minutes
Studio: New Line Cinema
Website: http://www.benjaminsmovie.com/
Release Date: 2002-03-07
Cast: Ice Cube, Mike Epps, Tommy Flanagan, Anthony Michael Hall, Eva Mendes
Director: Kevin Bray
Screenwriter: Ice Cube, Ron Lang
WorkNameSort: All About the Benjamins
Our Rating: 3.00
Early on in “All About the Benjamins,” Ice Cube pronounces that “Money feels better than pussy.” It’s a contextually honest moment, backed up by scenes of large-chested females getting their heads blown off and being thrown into harm’s way so that Cube and Mike Epps can simulate Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker in an energetic if dinky-brained bling-bling ode suggestive of a Sam Peckinpah buddy/blaxploitation comedy. Cube plays Miami-based badass bounty hunter Bucum Jackson (the name alone begs for a Curtis Mayfield theme song). Bucum is tracking feckless petty criminal Reggie Wright (Epps), who has not only won the lottery but has run afoul of Eurotrash diamond thieves led by evil Irish yacht dealer Robert Williamson (Tommy Flanagan) and his moll, Ursula (Carmen Chaplin). Nothing makes sense, but it does so quickly and explosively. However, the high gore quotient is off-putting for what should be, and often is, an enjoyable if ethically threadbare caper flick.
This article appears in Mar 6-12, 2002.