Eight-Tray Gangster: The Making of a Crip

This documentary gives the camera over to LA gang members - of whom there are an estimated 80,000 - and a community activist, Kershaun 'Lil Monster' Scott, a member of the CRIPs (Common Resources for an Independent People). His is not a savoury tale. We follow Scott through the neighbourhoods and up into the hills for gun practice, as he explains what he sees as the inevitable process of initiation into gang membership: the need for self-defence and survival. The other interviewees are his brother 'Kody Monster', jailed aged 14 for first-degree murder, filmed in prison, and their mother. Director Wright offers no analysis, little distance, and regrettably, in the end, little genuine insight. The most moving scene is in the casualty department of the Daniel Freeman Hospital, which resembles a WWI first-aid post: mothers sit with heads bowed and nurses are left, literally, to pick up the pieces.