Wonderful character development!

Am I Missing Something?

A Brilliant Conflict

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

ATL tells the story of four best friends about to graduate and shows their life stories as they grow up and hang out with each other. Despite this movie not being one that you would take too seriously, i thought the story about 4 friends moving on after high school and resolving issues at the local skate ring they always hung out at was a decent idea, and the acting was actually pretty good. T.I. as the lead character was pretty good. This is not a movie to be taken very seriously, but for what it is, it does a decent job capturing Atlanta's hip hop scene and a lot of the drama that is involved with the kids out there. It shows the real hood part of Atlanta and i guess it demonstrates it well. Also many people don't know that "skating" is actually a trend in some hip-hop parts. Many critics I've read from said the skating was really weird or other negative things. The story is good and it kinda seems like a true story. I also found Big Boi to be funny in this, along with the other group of friends. In my opinion the IMDb rating is underlooked and underrated, comparing this rating to rottentomatoes- there is a difference

ATL a movie with heart. It did not try to be over the top. It told a deep story about family bonds and love. Drug dealing and crime where shown in their true light. One part that stuck with me was seeing the young brother selling on a corner then he gets rolled by older dealers for his drugs. Perfect song was playing in the background. Great bit of directing there. T.I. and the actor from Forrest Gump have chemistry. I felt that uncle and nephew bond. I liked seeing a movie about life in a tough neighborhood that was about relationships. It wasn't a story about drug dealers only looking to make money. This was real life beautifully told.

I have been to Atlanta three times. But I have never seen anything in ATL like I have seen in the city of Atlanta. This was the acting debut of Evan Ross (AKA Diana Ross's youngest son and Tracee Ellis Ross' little brother.) He was the best actor in the movie. It was cool to see fly Tae Heckard and fly Lauren London in this movie. Even Monica Arnold had a walk on role in this movie. Jason Weaver and Tasha Smith are type-casted with the same type of roles in every movie that they are in! Tasha Smith always play the young mean mother of outgoing girls. TI and Big Boi need to stick with music. They cannot act! Why did they have to copy the plot of Roll Bounce? Overall, the plot of this movie was very predictable. We should have known that the movie would have a happy ending.

I really don't understand the low user rating for this film - the number of "one" ratings is unnaturally high, suggesting that there was some sort of campaign to skew the rating lower. ATL is a very good movie, despite it's rather clichéd plot. It's made with energy and style and an obvious love for the characters. I was especially impressed by the movie's complex understanding of how these characters talk and interact with each other. I'm kind of a sucker for this kind of movie (I was also a fan of The Wood, a much lighter and brighter version of ATL), so I may have "over-rated" it slightly - but believe me, it does not deserve its current 3.7 rating.