Video trailer for the award winning movie Bomb The System
Bomb The System
A Film About Street Art and Graffiti Culture
A Drops Entertainment production. (International sales: The Film Sales Company, New York.) Produced by Ben Rekhi, Sol Tryon. Executive producers, Kanwal Rekhi, Mark Webber. Co-executive producer, Rob Bethge. Co-producers, Smriti Mundhra, Theo Sena. Directed, written by Adam Bhala Lough.
Synopsis: “The average New Yorker sees upwards of 50 pieces of graffiti a day. But they never stop to think about the stories behind those pieces… this is one of those stories.” Bomb the System is the first… “The average New Yorker sees upwards of 50 pieces of graffiti a day. But they never stop to think about the stories behind those pieces… this is one of those stories.” Bomb the System is the first feature in over 20 years to delve into the world of graffiti art. Bomb The System, shot entirely on the streets of New York City, is the feature debut of 23-year-old writer/director Adam Bhala Lough. Mark Webber (People I Know, Storytelling, The Laramie Project) leads a talented young ensemble cast as Blest, a 19-year-old graffiti writer fresh out of high school with no ambition for the future. New York City is Blest’s playground. He spends his days stealing spray paint from local hardware stores – and his nights getting high and “bombing” the streets with his graffiti crew. He is the most wanted writer on the NYPD Vandal Squad’s hit list, and at the same time, is attracting attention from the local gallery scene. But things quickly turn ugly when 15-year-old Lune, the youngest member of Blest’s crew, is arrested and brutalized by the NYPD. The crew retaliates by waging an all out “graffiti war” against the city: a war that ends up costing more than one life in the end. Bomb the System is a true New York story – a cinematic poem dedicated to the art of graffiti, and to the city where it all began more than two decades ago.
Bomb the System is a drama film written and directed by Adam Bhala Lough, which was released to film festivals in 2002 and American theaters in 2005. It revolves around a group of graffiti artists living in New York City who decide to make a mark on the city, and stars Mark Webber, Gano Grills, Jaclyn DeSantis, Jade Yorker, Bönz Malone and Kumar Pallana. Bomb the System was the first major fictional feature film about the subculture of graffiti art since Wild Style was released 1982. Several well-known graffiti artists participated in the making of Bomb The System including Lee Quinones, Cope2 and Chino BYI. The film’s score and soundtrack were composed by El-P.
In January 2004 Bomb The System was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best First Feature.
Bomb The System
A Hip Hop Culture Film
There is an inherent appeal to this kind of subculture of reckless endangerment, social disobedience, and vandalism for the sake of cultural expression and artistic freedom that has a particular romanticism about it, like reinventing the Robin Hood mythology armed with spray paint cans. Bomb the System shows the culture in an admiring, often flattering, light but never quite glorifies the lifestyle either. It is always careful to illustrate the futile cyclical nature of a bomber’s life to counteract the radical appeal, at ease in showing both the glamorous and destructive side of suburban graffiti art. Whether Bomb The System is “authentic” or not seems a moot point, because Bomb the System never feels fake. The graffiti art, featured by various artists too numerous to name, is nothing short of jaw-dropping, and the soundtrack (composed by E-LP) is fantastic.
