Dead Presidents

For this week’s episode, we watched the 1995 coming-of-age tale slash Vietnam War movie slash crime thriller “Dead Presidents,” produced and directed by Albert and Allen Hughes. It stars Larenz Tate, Keith David, Chris Tucker, N’Bushe Wright, Freddy Rodriguez and Bokeem Woodbine.

“Dead Presidents” is the story of Anthony Curtis, a soon-to-be high school graduate from the Bronx who chooses to join the Marines in search of his own destiny. The year is 1969 and he is sent to Vietnam, leaving his family, his girlfriend Juanita and his friends behind. He experiences the worst of the war and returns home, angry and alienated, to his old girlfriend and his daughter. His friends, who also went to war, have also had their own trials. Each desperate for meaning and for money, they devise a plan to rob an armored car. As you might expect, things get quickly out of hand.

In the course of the episode, Jamelle and John discuss the experience of Black veterans in America’s wars, the role of Vietnam in American national memory and the way race shapes our understanding of crime.

The tagline for “Dead Presidents” is “The only color that counts is green.” You can find the move for rent on iTunes and Amazon.

Episodes come out every two weeks, so we will see you then with an episode on the first James Bond film of the 1990s, “Goldeneye.”

Connor Lynch produced this episode. Artwork by Rachel Eck.

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