Less than a month after receiving all kinds of buzz for the 20-year anniversary of Love Jones, Larenz Tate stars in a new buzz-worthy crime drama on Netflix.
One of hip hop’s strongest off-the-mic duos continues to be Queen Latifah and Shakim Compere, the pioneering co-founders launched their Flavor Unit Entertainment imprint back in 1995. Couple Latifah and Compere with content-production juggernaut Netflix, and a pretty dope project is more than likely to be the final result. Mix in one of the urban film world’s favorite leading men, veteran actor Larenz Tate, and there’s great reason to be optimistic about an evening of home cinema. I’m not quite sure where we are with the shelf like of “Netflix and chill” from the past few years.
This past weekend, Netflix subscribers could stream Flavor Unit’s latest film Deuces. Pleasantly surprised, after 15-20 minutes in Tate and co-star Lance Gross hadn’t given any reason to throw up a peace sign at co-writer/director Jamal Hill’s project. Parallels to Brian De Palma’s Carlito Brigante immediately came to mind, but Deuces works well because its storyline doesn’t try to fill the shoes of a Carlito’s Way for very long.
Tate stars as Stephen “Deuces” Brooks, the streetwise leader of a small organized crime outfit who’s loyal to his cohort of hustlers, but simultaneously harbors big plans to exit the game for good. Sounds like another Ghost, huh? The story picks up as Deuces meets the kind of beautiful and loving woman that makes walking away from his thriving empire worth it in Janet Foster (Meagan Good). However, Deuces’ major moves with his partners Papers (Rick Gonzalez) and Face (Power’s Rotimi) has drawn the attention of the local law enforcement, who tabs game-ready detective Jason Foster/Maurice (Gross) to infiltrate the crew and shut it down.
The Deuces-Janet-Jason triangle keeps the film from picking up many of Carlito’s ways. Jason – better known in the streets as Maurice or ‘Rice – eventually finds himself in a similar situation to Johnny Depp’s ‘Donnie’, but with his sister so deeply involved, closing his case becomes even further complicated.
Deuces maintains a solid pace, stays at its best scale and is entertaining throughout. While its conclusion feels all too familiar, Hill’s execution is as fresh as it can be. Fellas, Meagan doesn’t bare it all like Carlito’s ‘Gail’ (Penelope Ann Miller), but she delivers a nice surprise. Still in its first week of streaming, Deuces sits at a 7.3 out of 10 for its rating on IMDB, and that’s fair enough to draw folks in without setting them up for a huge disappointment. Check it out!
Tate’s turn as a charming hustler in Deuces comes just a few months before fans can catch the Chicago native starring as ‘Councilman Rashad Tate’ on Season 4 of Power this summer.
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