At that time I was in the streets, carrying guns. When we pulled up to the, we actually thought it was the feds. Strike: It was funny because I was on the run from the feds at that time. Just give me a credit at the end of the movie.” It was called The Untitled Detroit Project at the time. I sent him a bunch of clothes, a bunch of footage of the parties. Maurice Malone (proprietor, the Hip Hop Shop): I get a call from the director, I’m thinking this a low-budget movie. It was kind of like watching your best friend graduate from college. We had all been in the scene for a moment. Marvin “MarvWon” O’Neal (local MC 8 Mile cast member): That was real cool. 1 He went through and watched tons of tape and saw people rapping live. Rosenberg: Ultimately the decision was Curtis’s. But they had me in the VIP entrance to go straight in. “Strike” Sanders (Lyckety-Splyt): Half of Detroit hip-hop was in line for that role. Strike was somebody local who was friends with a lot of people from the same scene, who had that sort of authenticity. Rosenberg: I’m pretty sure Ox was brought in by Steve Stoute.
Mali Finn, the casting director, she’d go to the clubs at two and three in the morning, and find people with the look. Omar Benson Miller (Sol George): I can remember it like it was yesterday.įenelon: We did the casting out of Detroit. We were freezing our balls off and having so much fun. We went to the basement at Saint Andrew’s: the Shelter.Įvan Jones (Cheddar Bob): It was the middle of winter in Detroit. Paul Rosenberg (Eminem’s manager and executive producer): Before we put the camera up to shoot one frame, we took everybody around the city, to all the spots that the story was based on. PreproductionĬarol Fenelon (executive producer): We went to Detroit three months before we started shooting.
8 mile final battle full#
Thankfully, 8 Mile - specifically, its heart-pumping, near-pitch-perfect finale, explored here in full - came along and forever immortalized the city’s grimy scene.
It took us a little while to catch on to Detroit. In the ’90s, we knew what was happening as it was happening in L.A. “That instinct,” Eminem says of his will to battle, “never goes away.” And although re-created on a soundstage in a warehouse for the movie, the Shelter was - and still is - a real place, where real, sweaty battles take place. we would move all the clothes out and open up the floor and let guys battle,” Malone says. Malone - inspired by the hip-hop parties he gleefully took in during a brief stint living in New York - then opened the Hip Hop Shop, which became the epicenter of Detroit rap. The lineage of Detroit battle rap goes, first, through the Rhythm Kitchen, a weekly party hosted by party promoter and clothing designer Maurice Malone at a Chinese restaurant called Stanley’s Mania Cafe. Those startling battle rap scenes were faithful re-creations of the actual battles Em came through on his way to the top.
8 mile final battle movie#
The movie culminates in a virtuosic sequence: Scarred, reeling, and increasingly inclined to give no fucks, B-Rabbit wades into the grimy dungeon of the Shelter to do battle with his demons - and the Leaders of the Free World. It was also, in no uncertain terms, a love letter to a scene. Rendered in muted blues and grays, obsessively authentic, and boldly understated, the result was, quite possibly, the best rap movie ever made. Eminem and his unlikely collaborator, director Curtis Hanson - fresh off a whimsical Michael Chabon adaptation, Wonder Boys - loosely approximated a few hard days of Marshall Mathers’s come-up in rough-and-tumble ’90s Detroit. We hoped it’d be good - we had no idea it’d be that good. When 8 Mile hit theaters in the fall of 2002, it was a minor revelation. To celebrate, Grantland will devote an entire week, from April 11 through April 18, to the various stories of this wholly original place. On April 17, ESPN will premiere 30 for 30: Bad Boys, a documentary about those unforgettable Pistons teams. From the ’80s Pistons to Bob Seger, Eminem to Miguel Cabrera, the Motor City is a rich tapestry of compelling figures, unbelievable moments, and uniquely American ingenuity. Few cities have as rich a cultural and sporting history as Detroit.
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