"Beats" Movie Review

Directed by Chris Robinson, Beats centers around a teenage musical prodigy August Monroe, played by Khalil Everage, who suffers from the loss of his sister due to gun violence. He then goes to form a friendship with his high school’s security guard who was once a successful manager, Romelo Reese, played by Anthony Anderson. With their love of hip-hop, they try to help free each other from their broken past to rise into the music industry.

This film gave us a Chicago based coming of age drama where Romelo Reese learns about August’s musical talents, he sees an opportunity to take another shot back into the music industry. Romelo knows a good beat when he hears one, and he knows that August has the potential. From Romelo’s rocky roller coaster marriage and past mistakes in the music industry, and with August’s PTSD and panic attacks from the violence outside his door, this was a very predictable journey for both of them. It represented the everyday reality of what the majority of blacks who live in Southside Chicago face in their upbringing to success in life.

There were two different stories that felt like they were coming all at once. The first story was August Monroe’s, as he begins to familiarize himself with the outside world and to grow closer to his old crush through the music he writes for her. And secondly, there’s Romelo Reese, whose music industry fall came from an old client he once had. He sees August as another opportunity to have a second chance back into the music world.

This was an amazing film that showed the unseen struggles of PTSD within the black community in regards to violence. Capturing the struggles of life-changing mental shifts that our people experience after tragedy strikes and how we manage to pick ourselves back up from it through artwork or any type of passion we have to inspire others with our craft. The movie does sort of leave us with a cliffhanger wanting us to know what happens to August and his music career.