Cinema Eclectica

Ah-hah, hush that fuss, Pop Screen is back with Graham and Dreaming Machine's Joe to take a look at OutKast's 2006 movie vehicle Idlewild. It's not uncommon for rappers to make their big-screen debuts by playing gangsters, but as ever Andre 3000 and Big Boi found their own unique way of doing things, by setting it all in an anachronistically-scored Black bohemia in the 1930s. It's a gangster movie, it's a backstage musical, it's a Prohibition drama, it's a hip-hop film... it's so many things, in fact, that the audience were confused and stayed at home. While not perfect, it deserved a better fate. Join Graham and Joe as they discuss the film's dynamite cast, its odd but intriguing parent album - which is, as of 2022, the last OutKast record - and the shadow that one immortal Key and Peele sketch has cast over OutKast discourse. We also consider how the band's legacy only appears to have grown since their split, and reference that weird news story from a few years back about someone spotting Andre Benjamin ju