John Singleton found a perfect marriage of movie and moment
LOS ANGELES — Rarely have a filmmaker and a moment been so perfectly matched as John Singleton and the summer of 1991.
When “Boyz N the Hood” was released that July, Singleton took what had become a cultural obsession — South-Central Los Angeles and the young black men growing up in it — and imbued them with a depth, humour and humanity lacking in the scare stories and songs that up to that point had defined them to much of the world.
Singleton died Monday at age 51, after having a stroke earlier this month.
Nearly 30 years earlier he was fresh outta film school and in his early 20s when he took elements of his own upbringing, bathed it in the hip-hop culture of the late 80s and early 90s, and emerged with “Boyz N the Hood,” which would give him a groundbreaking Academy Award nomination and a permanent place in the American film pantheon.