"Above the Rim" Hip Hop Films Ep.1

Starting today, I will begin writing a series of articles about movies that display the culture of Hip Hop, these are movies that contain Hip Hop music in the scenes or on their soundtrack , and use Hip Hop artists as main characters or supporting characters.

For the first post of this series, I will start with the 1994 American drama "Above the Rim" starring Tupac Amaru Shakur, Marlon Wayans, Leon Robinson and the late Bernie Mac.

"Above the Rim" presents the story of a promising New York City high school basketball player portrayed by Duane Martin, and his relationships with two people, one a drug dealer portrayed by Tupac Shakur and the other a basketball star now employed as a security guard at his former high school portrayed by Leon Robinson. The movie was shot in Harlem with various scenes in the movie filmed at Manhattan Center high school in East Harlem.

The movie was nominated at the 1995 MTV Movie Awards for its soundtrack "Regulate" performed by Warren G and Nate Dog. The music video for "Regulate" also includes scenes from "Above the Rim" including an appearance by Tupac.

Soon as you start watching the movie, you will be greeted by "Pain" which was Hip Hop artist Tupac's debut for the Death Row label. While being featured through many movie scenes, "Pain" isn't present on the main soundtrack album.

The soundtrack album was released by Death Row and Interscope Records on March 22, 1994, and was executive produced by Suge Knight with Dr. Dre acting as a supervising producer on the project. Above the Rim: The Soundtrack was able to garner critical praise and obtain commercial success, a feat not easily accomplished for soundtracks albums in general, and Hip Hop based soundtracks albums in particular. The album shipped over two million copies and won the Soundtrack of the Year award at the 1995 Source Awards. It was the third album released under Death Row to reach number one on the R&B/Hip Hop Albums chart while reaching number two on Billboard 200.