Rapper's '8 Mile' film debut garners possible Oscar buzz By Hugh Hart
Special to The Denver Post
Sunday, October 20, 2002 -
The Denver Post / Cindy EnrightEminem in a tux? Delivering an Oscar acceptance speech? With censors at the ready?

It's entirely possible, according to industry insiders. "8 Mile," Eminem's feature-film debut, does not comes out until Nov. 8, but already positive momentum is building in the wake of a rough cut screened at the Toronto Film Festival last month. The New York Times posed the question: "Can he deliver the goods" and answered with a resounding "Yes."

Tom O'Neill, author of "Movie Awards: The Ultimate, Unofficial Guide to the Oscars, Golden Globes, Critics, Guild & Indie Honors" (Penguin Putnam), concurred: "The buzz on '8 Mile' at this point is excellent. People are beginning to whisper, 'Do you think it's really possible that Eminem could be nominated for an Oscar?' Critics are at least asking the question."

Working in Eminem's favor: In "8 Mile," the Grammy-winning Detroit rapper has surrounded himself with Hollywood heavyweights. Unlike last fall's offerings from Mariah Carey ("Glitter") and 'N Sync singer Lance Bass ("On the Line"), "8 Mile" boasts A-List talent including Oscar-nominated director Curtis Hanson ("L.A. Confidential"), Oscar-winner Kim Basinger, who plays his mom, and the critically respected young actress Brittany Murphy as his girlfriend.

It also helps that Eminem (born Marshall Mathers) is sticking to the persona he has cultivated via MTV videos, award show appearances and platinum-selling albums "The Slim Shady LP" (1999), "The Marshall Mathers LP" (2000) and "The Eminem Show"(2002). Set in his hometown of Detroit, "8 Mile" features Eminem as an angry white rapper engaged in a week-long rap "battle" while trying to sort out personal problems.

"Whenever a pop star tries to cross over to film, the question is whether or not moviegoers will buy the star in the role they've chosen," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of Exhibitors Relations Inc., which tracks box office trends. "You either have to match what you're already known for - Look at Madonna. In 'Evita,' she was in her element and that movie did fairly well, over $50 million - or do the absolute opposite of your image, like Dwight Yoakum, who was incredible in 'Sling Blade."'

Of course, the film itself needs to click.

"When Madonna did 'The Next Best Thing' with Rupert Everett and Benjamin Bratt, it did not do well because people didn't find her convincing in the part and it wasn't a very good movie," Dergarabedian said. "Just because you love Lance Bass, doesn't mean you're going to enjoy 'On the Line.' A movie has to hold up on its own no matter how much you admire a particular star."

The last time a white rapper tried to capitalize on his popularity in film, the reception was, well, "Cool as Ice." That 1991 feature flopped at the box office just months after its star, Vanilla Ice, hit it big on MTV.

"The difference," Dergarabedian said, "is that was a really bad movie. If 'Cool as Ice' had somehow been a great movie, people would have accepted it. Having a big pop star brand name is insurance, but it's no guarantee the film will be a hit. The bottom line is, you have to have the goods."

Eminem fans happy

Kim Osorio, executive editor of The Source, a monthly magazine devoted to hip-hop culture, predicts "8 Mile" will, at the very least, satisfy Eminem fans. And that group, she points out, includes both white suburban kids as well as black music fans.

"You've got to understand where Eminem comes from," she explained. "Even though he's white, he comes from the hip-hop community. Like any MC, whatever color, he started out at the bottom and worked his way to the top because he has so much talent in terms of writing rhymes."

To be sure, the Elvis Effect accounts for part of Eminem's popularity. Like Presley, Eminem is a white artist who took a music rooted in black culture and broadened its commercial appeal.

"Eminem, with all of his issues, and the things he does talk about, a lot of people from the white community can relate to that. People were already paying attention to hip-hop, but now, with Eminem, you have hip-hop crossing these cultural boundaries even more. The white record-buying public is relating to him, maybe more than black artists."

And with "8 Mile," Eminem, like Presley, is translating his bad-boy image to the big screen. But where Presley lost his rebel edge over a succession of profitable but mediocre films, Eminem won't be sacrificing street credibility in his bid for a wider audience, said Osorio.

"If you ask any rapper right now, 'Who's the best,' they'll say Jay-Z, they're going to say Naz. And they're definitely going to name Eminem because he's really coming up with good music on top of his lyrical game, and that's very important to hip-hop people."

Osorio saw a preview screening of "8 Mile" at a music conference in Puerto Rico last month and felt the film showcased precisely those strengths.

"I liked '8 Mile' for what it was," she said. "If you're not a hip-hop fan, I don't know how much you'd enjoy it. The whole thing with his mom, that didn't appeal to me so much, but the scenes where he's battling against other rappers, that's what I related to, and that's what I think hip-hop fans will enjoy."

A different slant

Taking a more jaundiced view on the whole subject of rapper/actors is Samuel L. Jackson, who last summer declared he would not play a supporting role in films that star rap artists.

"It's not my job to validate their careers as actors," he said. "Producers who hire rappers to star in movies are actually hiring their fan base."

Jackson, whose most recent hit, "XXX," featured the rapper Eve in a supporting role, added, "They're hoping that the people who buy those CDs will come to see that movie, and if they don't see the movie, they'll buy the soundtrack and they'll get their money back anyway. I can just imagine those guys sitting in a studio - 'If we hire this dude, he'll probably give us a song. It's gonna be large.'

"They haven't made the poster, they haven't written one line of dialogue for the script but they're going, 'Check it out: The soundtrack's gonna be huge."'

In fact, the "8 Mile" soundtrack album, set for an Oct. 29 release, may in fact be huge. But for the movie itself to make major waves commercially, the film needs to attract moviegoers who've never bought an Eminem record in their lives.

"You need that core fan base to have a modest success, but to really generate a big hit, you need to reach three or four times that many people," Dergarabedian said.

Doing some rough arithmetic, Dergarabedian figures that if each of the 2.4 million music fans who bought "The Eminem Show" CD during its first three weeks of release last June showed up to see "8 Mile" on opening weekend, the film would rack up roughly $16 million in box office receipts. Respectable, yes, but insufficient to blow its rivals out of the water. (As of last week, the CD had sold at least 6 million copies.)

Crossover essential

What's needed to make "8 Mile" a hit, Dergarabedian said, is the kind of crossover appeal found in Ice Cube's latest movie, "Barbershop." That film exceeded demographic expectations on the strength of its story and performances.

"I'm sure Ice Cube brought in his fan base to see 'Barbershop,' but if they didn't like the movie it wouldn't be getting the word of mouth. Because it's a good movie and was well-reviewed, people came back."

"Barbershop" opened No.1 at the box office the first weekend in September and has earned more than $65 million.

But box office is only one measure of success. Even if "8 Mile" flounders commercially, awards expert O'Neill says Eminem will likely come out on the other side with an enhanced artistic reputation.

"Movie critics love to smack people around," he said. "If they wanted to go after Eminem, he'd be an easy target. 'Here's this overblown ego having the nerve to even try acting.' So the fact that they've been treating him respectfully in their reviews is already enough of a victory for this guy."

And for a crossover act like Eminem, Oscar isn't the only awards game in town. There's next February's Grammy awards to consider as well, and on that front, O'Neill believes "8 Mile" could boost Eminem's run at the top prize.

"Because he's taken more seriously now, as an artist, 'The Eminem Show' is gaining strength as we head into the Album of the Year race. Bruce Springsteen and 'The Rising' seemed pre-ordained to win, but because Eminem is being discussed as an Oscar rival, it makes the future Grammy race interesting. He's being taken seriously as an artist."