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Janelle Levine
Professor Butler
English 1102
11 April 2018
Essay #2
Tales from the Hood is a 1995 horror anthology film directed by Rusty Cundieff and executive-produced by Spike Lee. The film presents four short urban-themed horror stories centering on police brutality, domestic abuse and gang violence; all presented within a frame story of three drug dealers buying some “found” drugs from an eccentric and story prone funeral director who in the end, turns out to be the devil. Similar to Get out, this film tackled the challenges of existing while being black in America through a horror lens told through four short stories. I personally believe that this is one of the greatest movies ever made by a black director because it really makes you think about how you should act and treat others, especially your own “brother”. In each story the funeral director tells, the main character of that story has died in horrible way, due to the consequences of their actions. Whether or not they were a good person in the end dictated if they were to be in Hell with him.
The first story tells about an African American man who is struck with grief for not helping his fallen brother, a politician trying to save his city from police corruption named Martin Morehouse, from the brutality of crooked cops (who are also the man’s superiors as he is a rookie cop) and subsequently must bring them to his “brother’s” grave so that he may avenge him. The former cop then brings his old superiors to the cemetery, where a zombie-like Morehouse is waiting to seek his revenge. In the second story, A boy’s mother dates an abusive stepfather who eventually causes the boy to show up to school with bruises. A concerned teacher notices these bruises and shows up to the boy’s home trying to see what is going on. After a violent confrontation with the boy’s stepfather, the teacher is shown the boy’s supernatural capability of destruction that leads to the stepfather’s demise. Story three takes place in the south and focuses on a racist former KKK member running for office and living in a former plantation where hundreds of slaves were murdered by their owner after becoming free with the help of the emancipation act. Their souls were never placed to rest and in turn, were stored in dolls occupying the home by a voodoo practitioner. Now the man must deal with the dolls who want him out of the house. The final story sees a gang banger gunned down by rivals and placed in a sort...
