As part of my research for my foundation portfolio in A2 media studies, i analysed Crips and Bloods: Made in America

1. Crips and Bloods: Made in America
By Levi Hodge

2. Production Details
Crips and Bloods: Made in America is an observational
documentary that I believe has a expository aspect to it. The
documentary was directed by Stacy Peralta and also written
by Peralta as well. However, there was also an input from
Sam George in the writing process. Following on from this,
Crips and Bloods: Made in America was produced by Gang
Documentary, The Balance Vector Productions and Verso
Entertainment and Gravitas Ventures in 2008. The
documentary was not as successful in the box office as some
documentaries because of the fact that it only made
$13,978 in the opening weekend.

3. Outline of the Documentary
The observational documentary, Crips and Bloods: Made
in America, simply observes the notorious American
gangs, The Crips and the Bloods, hence the name of the
documentary. The documentary successfully studies the
background of both the gangs and gives a first person
perspective on what has caused the young African
Americans to get involved in such devastating gang
violence. Peralta has been successful at conveying this
because he has included a range of gang members with
different stories behind them. He also includes interviews
with old gang members.

4. Type of Documentary
and its features
As already briefly mentioned, Crips and Bloods: Made in
America is an Observational documentary; meaning that is
has been created to simply observe a particular subject.
However, I do believe that this documentary have got
some expository elements. One could say that the
audience knows this is a an observational documentary
because of the fact that Stacy Peralta adopts many of the
codes and conventions of a typical documentary in this
style. Key codes and conventions such as the voice of
God/authority, reconstructions, interviews and the ‘fly on
the wall’ camera technique.

5. Narration
I believe the narration part of the documentary have been
used in a really productive manner and the audience are
immediately made to feel that the different elements of
narration have been explored. Majority of the documentary
consisted of the voice of God, this was adopted by Forest
Whitaker throughout film. Forest Whitaker give the
audience information such as background information and
geographical locations for the Bloods and Crips. In addition
to this, the voice have authority has also been employed;
Peralta was successful at this by allowing people such as
Aquil Basheer, a gang intervention worker, and Dr Gerald
Horne, an author, to give there expertise and opinion on the
notorious gangs. One could say this makes the audience feel
that what they are watching conveys a high sense of
honesty. It can also be seen as challenging Diane Tammes’
quote of ‘Everyone who makes a film is putting their truths
on the screen’ because Peralta has allowed different
opinions to be portrayed and not sole his own.

6. Interviews
In Crips and Bloods: Made in America, Stacy Peralta has
demonstrated a good use of the different interviewing styles
and techniques. Throughout the documentary there are
numerous talking head interviews. These are with gang
members, ex gang members and experts within this subject.
During the documentary cinema verite is conveyed because we
hear the interviewers voice when he asks the gang member a
question and he also appears in the shot. Towards the end of
the documentary there is a talking head interview with one of
the gang member’s Nan, who spoke about unfortunately losing
her grandson through gang violence and doing what he thought
was right. Some could say that Peralta have used a close up on
this interview to show the emotion being portrayed from the
gang member’s Nan. This then cuts in to montage of clips from
the funeral and the place of remembrance there is non diegetic
soft sympathetic music playing to create a sense of sadness and
sorrow. Following on from this, there is a further montage of
talking head interviews with mothers who have also lost their
sons. The non diegetic sound continues throughout this
emphasising on the feeling of sadness and sorrow and the sense
of loss.

7. Stereotypes
In terms of stereotypes in Crips and Bloods: Made in America, I
think there has been some that have been reinforced, however
there have been some that have been challenged. There is a
talking head interview with a gang member explaining that you
cannot show emotion if you are part of one of the gangs. This
reinforces the stereotype of young men or men in particular
should not show emotion if they are a ‘real man’. But one could
say that only real men show emotion, but for this stereotype to
be challenged it would have more than likely caused one of the
members to be killed. However the negative stereotype of drugs
is mostly used by black or young males is challenged because
there is a newspaper clipping showing a statistic of ‘about 80% of
drug users are white’. However it also shows the audience that
‘the vast majority of those arrested are black’, so even though it
is shown that it is mainly white people, black people are still
being put in a negative light for it.

8. Reconstructions
Reconstructions is another code and convention that has
been used by Stacy Peralta. An example of this would be
the comic-style reconstruction of the Watts riots that
started in 1965 from a drug trafficking police stop. This is a
good way to show the audience what happened, from the
man being stopped right through to missiles being thrown
at the police. One could say that this does not create a
sense of realism because of the fact that it is a cartoon
style comic, however, the factual information have been
included. In addition to this, the fact that it have been
reconstructed in black and white gives the reconstruction
and ‘old’ effect.

9. Archive Footage
Archive footage is stock footage that could be used to
portray key historical events. This have been used a
numerous amount of times in Crips and Blood: Made
in America because a lot of the gang violence today
has been influenced by events that has happened in
the past. When the ex gang members talk about their
time being involved in notorious gangs and violence it
cuts away to stock footage and photos of them
involved when they were younger. This creates a
sense of realism and honesty to the audience
because they are made to believe what is being
shown is the truth. To create an emphasis on this and
to show what the gang members are saying is the
truth, horrific archive images have been used
showing young men injured. This shows the dangers
the Crips and Bloods put them self through. Majority
of the archive footage is evident to the audience
because of the use of black and white. This conveys
that the footage is old because of the effect.

10. Influence
In my own opinion I believe that this documentary has
influenced both the audience and the members of the
notorious gangs, Bloods and Crips. I believe that it has
influenced the members to sit back at think is what
they are doing the right thing? Can it be changed?. At
the end of the documentary there is talking head
interviews of members who have done this and
realised that there family is more important and the
fact that he do not want his children to grow up in his
footsteps. So it is evident that it can be done and
hopefully cause more members to consider it. Leading
on to my next point, I also think that Peralta is trying to
impulse a similar message to the audience. Some could
say that this message is that no matter how chaotic,
extreme, bad your life was, it can be changed for the
better. At the end of the documentary it also shows
that ex gang members are working together to try and
engage both gangs to also work together and stop this
historical notorious violence once and for all.