Waist Deep
Encyclopedia
Waist Deep is a 2006 drama-action film
directed by Vondie Curtis-Hall
, starring Tyrese Gibson and Meagan Good
. It is loosely based on the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde
, including some similar subplots including the two main characters on the road, trying to avoid police, and committing bank robberies.
's young son, Henry Hunter Hall), ever again.
When O2 shows up late to pick Junior up from school one afternoon, he swears that he will always come back for Junior. That promise is put to the test just moments later when O2's vintage 1960's Chevrolet Impala SS Lowrider convertible is stolen from him at gunpoint
in the middle of a crowded Southland intersection — with Junior in the back seat.
O2 chases the car and gets into a nasty gun battle with the carjackers — circumstances that then make it impossible for O2 go to the police — but to no avail.
O2 does, however, catch up with Coco (Meagan Good
), a woman who sells stolen suits on the streets for a thug known as P Money (Julius Denem). O2 knows she is the one who marked him for the carjacking, and he forces her to help him retrieve Junior. Lucky (Larenz Tate
), Otis' unreliable cousin who works for Big Meat (Jayceon "Game" Taylor), the brutally vicious leader of the Outlaw Syndicate, also offers to help.
After a few hours on the street, Lucky comes back with some bad news: Junior has fallen into Meat's hands, and Meat (the main antagonist of the film) is demanding that O2 deliver $100,000 by midnight the following night, or Junior will die. Otis claims that he has no money, but Meat thinks otherwise: Meat was once O2's partner in crime, and he thinks O2 is still holding onto the $100,000 they made off their last job together — the job that got O2 six years in prison.
Desperate to raise the cash, O2 comes up with a plan: he and Coco will rob P Money's and Meat's own operations, staging it to look like the one is stealing from the other, and thereby triggering a gang war that will hopefully eliminate both and help O2 and Coco rescue Junior. After a successful robbery of one of the Big Meat's locations, O2 and Coco come across a set of safe deposit box keys belonging to numerous banks in the area. The next day with time wearing thin, they stage a number of bank robberies and are able to retrieve expensive jewellery, which Lucky offers to get rid of eager to prove his worth. When Lucky takes the jewelry to Big Meat unknowing that it belongs to Big Meat, Lucky is forced to set up a meeting between himself, O2, and Coco, with Big Meat along to end O2 once and for all.
They take a car to an alley and give him the money. It is then revealed that Big Meat never intended to let Junior live, as he signals one of his men to kill Junior. Lucky sees this and tackles him as the man shoots many shots, one shooting Lucky in the side of the chest. O2 kills Meat's men, leaving only Meat. He then proceeds to shoot O2 but has no shots remaining. O2 shoots and kills him and retrieves Junior.
On the road, they stop at a gas station to attend to Lucky's wound. O2 tells Lucky that they will get him to a hospital, but he realizes that Lucky has died. Swerving off the road, they are chased by the cops. O2 hides in a parking lot and tells Coco that she must take Junior and go to the Mexican border while he outruns the cops. As Junior and Coco escape, O2 is tailed by the cops. They run him to a dead end where the lake is. O2, realizing he has no choice, drives straight into the water.
In Mexico, Coco and Junior are living in a house on a beach. They are walking on the beach when Junior sees something in the distance. He and Coco find that it is O2, who has escaped the ocean and come back to them, as he promised. They then reunite.
|}
Action film
Action film is a film genre where one or more heroes is thrust into a series of challenges that require physical feats, extended fights and frenetic chases...
directed by Vondie Curtis-Hall
Vondie Curtis-Hall
Vondie Curtis-Hall is an American actor and film director.As an actor, he is best known for his role as Dr. Dennis Hancock on the CBS medical drama Chicago Hope created by David E. Kelley.-Early life:...
, starring Tyrese Gibson and Meagan Good
Meagan Good
Meagan Monique Good is an American film and television actress and occasional film producer. Beginning her career at the age of four, Good has appeared in numerous commercials, television shows, feature films, and music videos....
. It is loosely based on the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde
Bonnie and Clyde (film)
The film was originally offered to François Truffaut, the best-known director of the New Wave movement, who made contributions to the script. He passed on the project to make Fahrenheit 451. The producers approached Jean-Luc Godard next...
, including some similar subplots including the two main characters on the road, trying to avoid police, and committing bank robberies.
Plot
Ex-con Otis (Tyrese Gibson), or "O2" as he was once known on account of his ability to vanish from a crime scene like oxygen, has done his time and is now determined to stay out of trouble and never leave his young son, Otis, Jr. (played by Vondie Curtis-HallVondie Curtis-Hall
Vondie Curtis-Hall is an American actor and film director.As an actor, he is best known for his role as Dr. Dennis Hancock on the CBS medical drama Chicago Hope created by David E. Kelley.-Early life:...
's young son, Henry Hunter Hall), ever again.
When O2 shows up late to pick Junior up from school one afternoon, he swears that he will always come back for Junior. That promise is put to the test just moments later when O2's vintage 1960's Chevrolet Impala SS Lowrider convertible is stolen from him at gunpoint
Carjacking
Carjacking is a form of hijacking, where the crime is of stealing a motor vehicle and so also armed assault when the vehicle is occupied. Historically, such as in the rash of semi-trailer truck hijackings during the 1960s, the general term hijacking was used for that type of vehicle abduction,...
in the middle of a crowded Southland intersection — with Junior in the back seat.
O2 chases the car and gets into a nasty gun battle with the carjackers — circumstances that then make it impossible for O2 go to the police — but to no avail.
O2 does, however, catch up with Coco (Meagan Good
Meagan Good
Meagan Monique Good is an American film and television actress and occasional film producer. Beginning her career at the age of four, Good has appeared in numerous commercials, television shows, feature films, and music videos....
), a woman who sells stolen suits on the streets for a thug known as P Money (Julius Denem). O2 knows she is the one who marked him for the carjacking, and he forces her to help him retrieve Junior. Lucky (Larenz Tate
Larenz Tate
Larenz Tate is an American film and television actor.-Early life:Tate was born on the west side of Chicago, Illinois, the son of Peggy and Larry Tate. He is the youngest of three siblings whose family moved to California when he was nine years old...
), Otis' unreliable cousin who works for Big Meat (Jayceon "Game" Taylor), the brutally vicious leader of the Outlaw Syndicate, also offers to help.
After a few hours on the street, Lucky comes back with some bad news: Junior has fallen into Meat's hands, and Meat (the main antagonist of the film) is demanding that O2 deliver $100,000 by midnight the following night, or Junior will die. Otis claims that he has no money, but Meat thinks otherwise: Meat was once O2's partner in crime, and he thinks O2 is still holding onto the $100,000 they made off their last job together — the job that got O2 six years in prison.
Desperate to raise the cash, O2 comes up with a plan: he and Coco will rob P Money's and Meat's own operations, staging it to look like the one is stealing from the other, and thereby triggering a gang war that will hopefully eliminate both and help O2 and Coco rescue Junior. After a successful robbery of one of the Big Meat's locations, O2 and Coco come across a set of safe deposit box keys belonging to numerous banks in the area. The next day with time wearing thin, they stage a number of bank robberies and are able to retrieve expensive jewellery, which Lucky offers to get rid of eager to prove his worth. When Lucky takes the jewelry to Big Meat unknowing that it belongs to Big Meat, Lucky is forced to set up a meeting between himself, O2, and Coco, with Big Meat along to end O2 once and for all.
They take a car to an alley and give him the money. It is then revealed that Big Meat never intended to let Junior live, as he signals one of his men to kill Junior. Lucky sees this and tackles him as the man shoots many shots, one shooting Lucky in the side of the chest. O2 kills Meat's men, leaving only Meat. He then proceeds to shoot O2 but has no shots remaining. O2 shoots and kills him and retrieves Junior.
On the road, they stop at a gas station to attend to Lucky's wound. O2 tells Lucky that they will get him to a hospital, but he realizes that Lucky has died. Swerving off the road, they are chased by the cops. O2 hides in a parking lot and tells Coco that she must take Junior and go to the Mexican border while he outruns the cops. As Junior and Coco escape, O2 is tailed by the cops. They run him to a dead end where the lake is. O2, realizing he has no choice, drives straight into the water.
In Mexico, Coco and Junior are living in a house on a beach. They are walking on the beach when Junior sees something in the distance. He and Coco find that it is O2, who has escaped the ocean and come back to them, as he promised. They then reunite.
Cast
| O2 | Tyrese Gibson |
| Coco | Meagan Good Meagan Good Meagan Monique Good is an American film and television actress and occasional film producer. Beginning her career at the age of four, Good has appeared in numerous commercials, television shows, feature films, and music videos.... |
| Lucky | Larenz Tate Larenz Tate Larenz Tate is an American film and television actor.-Early life:Tate was born on the west side of Chicago, Illinois, the son of Peggy and Larry Tate. He is the youngest of three siblings whose family moved to California when he was nine years old... |
| Big Meat | Jayceon Terrell Taylor (Game) |
| Junior | Henry Hunter Hall |
| Fencing House Lady | Kimora Lee Simmons Kimora Lee Simmons Kimora Lee Simmons is an American fashion model, and former president and Creative Director for Phat Fashions.-Early life:... |
| P Money | Julius Denem |
| Gas Attendant | Thomas Abate Thomas Abate Thomas Joseph Abate III , also known as Poverty, is a hip-hop artist and actor from the New England area.... |
|}
Differences from Bonnie and Clyde
- Bonnie and Clyde did not involve a child.
- Bonnie and Clyde is set in central United StatesCentral United StatesThe Central United States is sometimes conceived as between the Eastern United States and Western United States as part of a three-region model, roughly coincident with the Midwestern United States plus the western and central portions of the Southern United States; the term is also sometimes used...
during the Great DepressionGreat DepressionThe Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
; Waist Deep is set in Los Angeles in the 2000s. - Bonnie and Clyde did not survive, but their Waist Deep counterparts do.
Box office
Waist Deep grossed $9,404,180 from 1,004 theaters with a $9,366 average in its opening weekend. Altogether, the film grossed $21,353,303.Awards and nominations
- Film: Outstanding Hip-Hop Movie, (Nominated) BET Hip-Hop Movie Awards
- Tyrese Gibson: Outstanding Performance by a Lead Actor, (Nominated) Black Movie Awards
- Meagan Good: Outstanding Performance by a Lead Actress, (Nominated) Black Movie Awards, Choice Breakout Performance (Female), (Nominated) Teen Choice Award