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Rating:
Watching just a few frames of ATL, it's easy to tell director Chris Robinson has a music video background. Often that would be a backhanded compliment at best, but here it's genuine. With Crash, his long-time collaborator, serving once again as Robinson's DP, ATL boasts all the style of the best hip hop videos, but none of the insult -- it doesn't condescend, push products or fetishize. Robinson and screenwriter Tina Gordon Chism are instead interested in the sociology of youth culture, and the atmosphere that springs from it. In fact, Chism's dialogue about teen language patterns does for urban Atlanta youths what Donnie Brasco's analysis of the phrase "forget about it" did for wiseguys. The camera furthers the idea that the filmmakers are inside the content, rather than viewing it externally, and ATL shows a fondness for details that speak volumes -- a montage of dental bling, or a throwaway moment from the nightly operations of the local roller rink. If ATL is only an average coming of age story (with Antwone Fisher -- yes, that Antwone Fisher -- receiving story credit), that's because some substance must take a backseat to all this beautifully crafted style. ATL is also propelled by a perfectly interwoven stream of hip hop, lending extra electricity to the visuals. Rapper Tip "T.I." Harris makes a credible debut in the lead role, but his scowl on the poster is a little misleading. Like Dazed and Confused -- which has a similar ensemble structure and looseness to its plot -- ATL is a lot more about how teens have fun than how they perpetrate and intimidate. Even when things get heavy, the film stays as light as a carefree youth on roller skates -- which also helps it function as a ballad to the city whose abbreviated moniker serves as its title. Derek Armstrong, All Movie Guide

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