Nonureva Really Surprised!

Brightlyme i know i wasted 90 mins of my life.

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Ezmae Chang This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Ron Briseno I honestly thought it was a good flick -- worthy of 8-stars, but I'm giving the film 10-stars to counteract the tool who said he gave it 1-star because he thought the overall rating was too high. :)A powerful and realistic look into the gang culture within the Mexican American population. Very gritty and very disturbing, as a it should be.

mash_jay Let me justify my extreme rating: this is not the worst movie I have ever seen but I only give it a one out of ten because of the ridiculously high rating it has on IMDb and I want movie-aficionados to not make the same mistake I did and assume it's a movie worth buying.Yes it is an accurate portrait of prison life and all that, but man, the musical score resembles that of late 80s TV-movies and soap operas. The decors (except inside the prison) to me do not feel like they're filthy south central LA streets. The vocabulary used is as stereotypical and over the top as if it's a braindead kind of video game. More "ORALE's" in here than f-bombs and "DUDES" combined the big lebowski. And this limited and insulting range of words combined with the cardboard acting result in paper-cut, one dimensional, zombie characters. If you're a 12 yo kid who likes the godfather and scarface (but steven seagal too), you'll love this. But if you're looking for a quality cinematic experience, skip it and watch a documentary about "la EMe" instead.

polaral I've seen this movie a few times and while it does have it's moments, it also has some really fundamental flaws. Overall I consider it mediocre at best.WARNING, POSSIBLE SPOILER AHEAD...First of all I thought some of the prison scenes were a little on the far fetched side and really strained my credulity - specifically one where Pedro and company confront a rival black gang leader and his crew in the cell block for several minutes with hoots and jeers and toilet paper flying all around. I really can't believe that the prison guards wouldn't have intervened long before they did. And the idea that the Latino gang would dare to kill the Mafia crime bosses son was ridiculous.Secondly, as some other reviewers have commented, the overuse of the words "ese" and "homes". I'm not even a Latino and I found this stereotypical and contrived.The films was rather long and slow moving and could definitely benefited from editing.There were no really sympathetic characters and some of them were down-right repugnant. I didn't even particularly like Pedro's girlfriend, Yolanda. I can't empathize with someone who falls for a man who spent 18 years in the joint running a prison gang and is then surprised when he turns out to be a user and fake and not a social reformer. About the only person who seemed to have any honor at all was "El Japo" A movie needs to have someone you connect with and root for me to enjoy it.Lastly, there was no optimism at all to the ending. It seemed to say to me, "It's all hopeless and will never end". Rather depressing.Overall, a nice try, but fall short of the mark.

julian kennedy American Me: 3/10: In all fairness I have to admit I was expecting more of a gang picture (albeit a serious one) with Mexican overtones rather than a straightforward prison drama. American Me is a straightforward prison drama. Nobody in this film emotes and pass the K-Y jelly cause there is more guy on guy action in this movie than in the men's room at a Sex in the City wrap party. Add in the bathroom/drug smuggling scenes and you may be squirming in your seat for more reasons than a slow pace. In addition a lot of older actors can play characters in their twenties. Even those that have obvious hairline issues (see the later Porky's movies) seem to pull it off. Edward James Olmos is one man who should never even try. He looks like he was born fifty. He also plays the lead with the charisma of a sullen rock. In addition to the miscasting and sodomy American Me suffers from serious script issues. It simply takes at face value the characters contention that they are king of the world. They are not. It is one thing for the characters themselves to be misguided (as they are most certainly are) but the movie itself seems not to realize what big losers these guys are. Sure they are king of the cellblock. Hurrah, that's like being voted carny of the month. A good first 45 minutes or so quickly melts into underacted pathos (Nobody emotes in this movie, cause they are all tough guys see.) and misguided plot twists (the whole taking on the mob bit was horribly done). The movie just keeps getting worse and worse.Oh and Olmos's character writes poetry. Really bad rhyming poetry. Yup poetry and anal sex, American Me is one makeover away from its own Bravo series.