Poor, bogged down, money was scarce, sometimes leftwith no water, sometimes left with no heat, and sometimes left withnothing to eat. This was the life of Tupac Shakur.

Where were you on September 7, 1996 when Tupac gotshot? Were you on the Las Vegas strip listening to the gun shots,or were you sitting at home with your family, remembering one ofyour loved ones who may have been slain ruthlessly?

As we sit back and reminisce, our parents rememberthe days when Martin Luther King, Jr. and John F. Kennedy wereassassinated, but we remember the influences of Aaliyah, Lisa”Left-Eye” Lopes, Biggie Smalls aka Notorious BIG. But most of all,we remember the impact of what it really means to speak truththrough Hip-Hop and Rap through Tupac Shakur.

People always speak of Elvis still being alive andwell, and when Tupac died, people thought that he was still living,and this is so, to the extent of which he is resurrected in thestory of his life, now in theaters, titled, TupacResurrection.

The movie was narrated by Tupac himself which aloudthe documentary to have a lot more depth and feeling. When themovie began, there was a natural tendency to feel moved by thestoryline. Because the initial scenes of the movie were of Tupac’scar getting shot at, there was an instant silence radiatingthroughout the theater showing that from the very beginning of thefilm, the documentary was going to make an impact on people’slives.

The movie not only told the story of therapper, Tupac, but it told the story of a young boy and how he grewup in a poor urban area with his mother and sister strugglingthrough hard times. Although Tupac may have grown up in an areathat was poor his family life was rich with love, and his mother,Afeni Shakur who happens to be one of the executive producers ofthe film who was also once a Black Panther, taught her son to growup as a strong and intelligent Black man, especially educated inthe arts.

Much of the violence in the movie is a display ofwhat Tupac’s life was really like. Growing up Tupac was a good kid,but as he grew older, as a Black man, racial profiling landed himinto a system in which he always felt imprisoned whether innocentor not. In the movie, he tells the story about how his mother gavebirth to him in prison; therefore, he knew that it would be hisdestiny to end up in prison at some point; it was just a matter ofwhat point in life it would be and what would lead him there.

It was amazing how the producers of TupacResurrection were able to take old documentary footage of Tupac andcompile it into something that would make the movie feel as if hewere actually telling the story in the present. In many of hisanecdotes, he talks about his criminal past, how his mom’s drug usehad an effect on his life, his arrest for sexual assault, hisfriendship with Biggie Smalls, his political beliefs, the filmcareer, and how the first shooting was a foretelling of hisfuture.

Nonetheless, the movie was political innature, and really gave strong reasons to believe the world isstill segregated between White and Black in some aspects. So littlehas yet to be solved, but Tupac touches on this, and how much hehad a passion for his people to receive justice. He talked abouthow it would be if a rich person could come and live in hisneighborhood for a short amount of time and experience it. Hebelieved that this would be the best lesson for an affluent personto experience.

It was evident in Tupac Resurrection just how mucheducation and knowledge Tupac had. Yet, when he was living, hewasn’t really seen as being educated, but just another thug rappingto kids on the streets, but his raps are poetic stories of reallife situations that go on in people’s lives everyday. If it tookhis death and his resurrection through a movie to get his pointacross, well then, kudos to Tupac and the producers of this moviefor helping to put something genuinely realistic on the bigscreen.