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Better Luck Tomorrow | 2003 | R | - 7.6.10
A small group of talented and ambitious Asian-American high school students discovers what the phrase "power corrupts" really means when they find ingenious ways to make money by taking advantage of their fellow students. However, this sense of power and the greed it begets are more than some of them can handle. With Parry Shen, Jason J. Tobin, Sung Kang, Roger Fan and John Cho. [1:40]
SEX/NUDITY 7 - A woman takes off her clothes, approaches a young man, takes off his shirt, we hear his pants unzip, and then we see him lying in bed with the woman, who's moving rhythmically on top of him (we watch his face and hear him moan as he climaxes). A topless woman (we see her bare breasts) lies on top of a young woman and they kiss briefly. A bare-chested young man comes out of a bedroom with lipstick kisses on his chest (presumably, he has had sex with a woman). A topless woman in panties runs out of a room and covers herself with a pile of clothing. Two young men watch a pornographic video (we hear a man and a woman moaning and see their heads bobbing rhythmically), and in another scene we hear moaning as two young men watch a pornographic movie. A young man and a young woman kiss in several scenes. Two young men brag about their sexual conquests. A young man and a young woman hug several times, and a young man and a young woman dance holding each other close. Young men are bare-chested in a few scenes, a young woman wears tank tops in many scenes that reveal her cleavage, we see a young man in his jockey shorts, and a young woman drops her wrap to expose her bare shoulder and a tattoo. A young woman wears a low-cut dress that reveals her cleavage, bare shoulders and sometimes bare abdomen; also, cheerleaders wear short skirts that reveal their bare thighs. A young man watches with interest as a woman bends over and her top reveals cleavage. There are a few discussions about a young woman in an adult video.
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VIOLENCE/GORE 6 - A young man is beaten to death with a baseball bat (we see blood squirt onto people's faces, we see the beaten young man with a very bloody face and head and see a pool of blood forming on the floor around his head). A young man is suffocated by a cloth soaked in paint thinner; it is shoved in his mouth and we see him twitching and struggling as two other young men hold him and cover his mouth and nose. We hear a gunshot and see a young man with blood on his head and mouth and on a bed behind him (we see him later bandaged in a hospital bed), and another young man pounds on a door violently and yells when he hears the shot. A young man is held by the arms while another young man punches him repeatedly, a gun is pulled, three young men struggle over the gun, and it fires. We see a gray-tinged human hand with a worm slithering across it (the hand is apparently attached to a buried dead body). Three young men clean a puddle of blood off a floor and one of them vomits (we see goo and hear him gagging). A young man punches another young man who falls to the ground and is then kicked repeatedly and whipped with a belt. Two young men shove each other, exchange punches and kicks, and one of them pulls a gun on the other. A woman runs from a room when a young man pulls a gun on her, and he then holds the gun on three young men. A young man twirls a gun in his hands and three other young men scatter fearing they'll be shot accidentally. A young man talks about a dead body a couple of times. A young man wakes up with a very bloody nose (we also see blood on sheets). A young man is shoved into a garbage can head first, a young woman slaps a young man in the face, two young men shove each other, a young man shoves another young man to the ground, a young man smacks another young man on the head in two scenes, a young man's finger is pricked and we see a drop of blood land on a slide. A young man falls off his skateboard and hurts his arm. A young man vomits after drinking too much; once we hear him gagging and another time we see goo splatter on a shrub and hear him heaving. Young men dig a hole to bury a body. A dead fish floats on the surface of a fish tank and we see it being flushed down a toilet. We see a young man in a car holding an automatic weapon.
LANGUAGE 10 - 100 F-words, 3 obscene hand gestures, 1 obscene arm gesture, 19 sexual references (3 appear in the title of a CD), 40 scatological terms, 18 anatomical terms, 6 mild obscenities, 1 derogatory term for homosexuals, 2 religious profanities, 7 religious exclamations.
SUBSTANCE USE - Underage people are shown smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol -- to the point of inebriation -- and snorting cocaine.
DISCUSSION TOPICS - Friendship, love, power, greed, natural selection, belonging, adoption, affirmative action, cheating, addiction, stealing, supply and demand, prostitution.
MESSAGE - We must never become complacent in our temporary sense of happiness.
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.
Mufasa: The Lion King - 1.4.2
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 - 1.3.3
The Piano Lesson - 3.5.4
Homestead - 1.5.4
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We are a totally independent website with no connections to political, religious or other groups & we neither solicit nor choose advertisers. You can help us keep our independence with a donation.
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Become a member of our premium site for just $2/month & access advance reviews, without any ads, not a single one, ever. And you will be helping support our website & our efforts.
WHAT DO YOU THINK?
We welcome suggestions & criticisms -- and we will accept compliments too. While we read all emails & try to reply we do not always manage to do so; be assured that we will not share your e-mail address.