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The Hurricane | 1999 | R | - 3.6.8

Based on the true story of Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, a prize fighter wrongfully convicted of murder in the 1960s, and a teenager and his three teachers who befriended Carter while he was imprisoned and fought for his release. With Denzel Washington, Vicellous Reon Shannon, John Hannah, Liev Schreiber, Deborah Unger, Dan Hedaya, Clancy Brown, David Paymer, David Sparrow, Rod Steiger and Garland Whitt. [2:05]

SEX/NUDITY 3 - A little sexual innuendo (including a brief reference to gang rape) and a kiss. It's implied that a man is a pedophile; he approaches a group of boys and rubs one of their heads, saying something like "Do you want to make me feel good?" (nothing sexual happens, but violence ensues: see Violence/Gore). We see a few men's bare buttocks as they're standing in line to be searched by prison guards.

VIOLENCE/GORE 6 - Four people are shot (we see one shot in the head and one in the chest, with lots of blood visible); in several different scenes we see their bloody bodies slumped on a bar or lying on the floor in puddles of blood. A man who appears to be a pedophile and is trying to "pick up" a boy (see Sex/Nudity) is hit in the head with a bottle. He grabs the boy who threw the bottle and threatens to throw him off a ledge; the boy then stabs the man in the arm several times (no blood is visible) and runs away. We see three boxing matches with lots of punching (in two, we see men with swollen eyes, bloody noses and mouths and bloody facial cuts); all three end with one of the boxers being knocked out. We see news clips of police officers beating people with clubs, shoving a gun in the back of a man's neck and pushing people to the ground, presumably during civil rights demonstrations. A boy is dragged into a room by several police officers; one grabs his arm and verbally threatens him. A car crashes into a wall after one of its tires falls off (none of the passengers is injured). Something is thrown through two windows in a house. A man and woman briefly yell at each other. We see doctors with bloody gloves working on a man with an extremely bloody face.

LANGUAGE 8 - About 26 F-words, several anatomical references, lots of scatological references, many mild obscenities, many insults and several racial epithets.

DISCUSSION TOPICS - Wrongful convictions, racism, tampering with evidence, the U.S. judicial system, prison life, heroism, hostility, home schooling, being separated from family.

MESSAGE - Never give up in your fight for justice; innocent people can be proven guilty.

CAVEATS

Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.

We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.

Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.


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