One Eight Seven (also known and abbreviated as
187) is a
1997The year 1997 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*The Star Wars original trilogy's 20th Anniversary Special Editions are released.*Production begins on Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace....
dramaA drama film is a film genre that depends mostly on in-depth development of realistic characters dealing with emotional themes. Dramatic themes such as alcoholism, drug addiction, racial prejudice, religious intolerance, poverty, crime and corruption put the characters in conflict with themselves,...
/
crimeA crime film, in the most general sense, is a film that involves various aspects crime and the criminal justice system. Stylistically, it can fall under many different genres, most commonly drama, thriller, Mystery film and film noir...
/ thriller film, starring
Samuel L. JacksonSamuel Leroy Jackson is an American film and television actor. After Jackson became involved with the Civil Rights Movement, he moved on to acting in theater at Morehouse College, and then, films. He had several small roles, before meeting his mentor, Morgan Freeman, and the director Spike Lee...
, who plays a Los Angeles teacher caught with
gangA gang is a group of people who, through the organization, formation, and establishment of an assemblage, share a common identity. In current usage it typically denotes a criminal organization or else a criminal affiliation. In early usage, the word gang referred to a group of workmen...
trouble in an urban high school. The film was directed by Kevin Reynolds and its name comes from the
California Penal CodeThe California Penal Code forms the basis for the application of criminal law in the American state of California.-Organization:The code is divided into Parts 1 and 2, which each contain "titles," some of these being subdivided into "chapters," with "sections" comprising the smallest unit of content...
number, called
187 (murder)187 is a numeric code for the crime of murder. It is primarily used by law enforcement officials in the U.S. state of California—especially police, prosecutors, and judges—because Section 187 of the California Penal Code defines the crime of murder...
.
Trevor Garfield is a
blackAfrican Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have origins in any of the black populations of Africa. In the United States, the terms are generally used for Americans with at least partial Sub-Saharan African ancestry...
high school science teacher at Roosevelt Whitney High School, a high school in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn.
One Eight Seven (also known and abbreviated as
187) is a
1997The year 1997 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*The Star Wars original trilogy's 20th Anniversary Special Editions are released.*Production begins on Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace....
dramaA drama film is a film genre that depends mostly on in-depth development of realistic characters dealing with emotional themes. Dramatic themes such as alcoholism, drug addiction, racial prejudice, religious intolerance, poverty, crime and corruption put the characters in conflict with themselves,...
/
crimeA crime film, in the most general sense, is a film that involves various aspects crime and the criminal justice system. Stylistically, it can fall under many different genres, most commonly drama, thriller, Mystery film and film noir...
/ thriller film, starring
Samuel L. JacksonSamuel Leroy Jackson is an American film and television actor. After Jackson became involved with the Civil Rights Movement, he moved on to acting in theater at Morehouse College, and then, films. He had several small roles, before meeting his mentor, Morgan Freeman, and the director Spike Lee...
, who plays a Los Angeles teacher caught with
gangA gang is a group of people who, through the organization, formation, and establishment of an assemblage, share a common identity. In current usage it typically denotes a criminal organization or else a criminal affiliation. In early usage, the word gang referred to a group of workmen...
trouble in an urban high school. The film was directed by Kevin Reynolds and its name comes from the
California Penal CodeThe California Penal Code forms the basis for the application of criminal law in the American state of California.-Organization:The code is divided into Parts 1 and 2, which each contain "titles," some of these being subdivided into "chapters," with "sections" comprising the smallest unit of content...
number, called
187 (murder)187 is a numeric code for the crime of murder. It is primarily used by law enforcement officials in the U.S. state of California—especially police, prosecutors, and judges—because Section 187 of the California Penal Code defines the crime of murder...
.
Plot summary
Trevor Garfield is a
blackAfrican Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have origins in any of the black populations of Africa. In the United States, the terms are generally used for Americans with at least partial Sub-Saharan African ancestry...
high school science teacher at Roosevelt Whitney High School, a high school in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. A
gangsterA Gangster is a criminal who is a member of a crime organization, such as a gang. The terms are most commonly used in reference to members of the criminal organizations associated with American prohibition and the American offshoot of the Italian Mafia, such as the Chicago Outfit, the Philadelphia...
student to whom he had given a failing grade threatens to murder him, writing the number 187 on every page of one of Garfield's textbooks. The administration ignores the threat, and the thug ambushes Garfield in the hallway, stabbing him in the back and side abdominal area multiple times with a
shivA shiv is a slang term for any sharp or pointed implement used as a knife-like weapon, including knives themselves. However, the word in practical usage is frequently used when referring to an improvised bladed weapon. Shivs are commonly made by inmates in prisons across the world...
.
Fifteen months after surviving from the ordeal, Garfield, now a
substitute teacherA substitute teacher is a person who teaches a school class when the regular teacher is unavailable; e.g., because of illness, personal leave, or other reasons...
, has relocated to John Quincy Adams High School in the
San Fernando ValleyThe San Fernando Valley is an urbanized valley located in Southern California, United States. More than half of the city of Los Angeles' land area lies within the San Fernando Valley...
area of
Los AngelesLos Angeles is the largest city in the state of California and the second largest in the United States. Often abbreviated as L.A. and nicknamed The City of Angels, Los Angeles has an estimated population of 3.8 million and spans over in Southern California...
, but the trouble starts again when he becomes a substitute to a rowdy, unruly class of rejects, including a
ChicanoThe terms Chicano and Chicana were originally used by, and in reference to U.S. citizens of Mexican descent. The term began to be widely used during the Chicano Movement mainly amongst Mexican Americans, especially in the movement's peak in the late 1960's and early 1970's...
tag crew by the name of "Kappin' Off Suckers" (K.O.S.). Their leader, Benito "Benny" Chacón, a menacing felon attending high school as a condition of
probationProbation is a sentence which may be imposed by a court in lieu of incarceration. A criminal who is "on probation" has been convicted of a crime but has served only part of the sentence in jail, or has not served time at all...
, makes it clear to Garfield that there will be no mutual respect between them.
The tension mounts when a fellow teacher, Ellen Henry, confides that Benny has threatened her life, an action against which the administration of the school refuses to take action, fearing legal threats. Ellen and Garfield develop a close friendship that approaches the beginnings of a relationship, but which is stymied by Garfield's diffident and destabilizing behavior, likely arising from PTSD and his confrontations with the K.O.S.. Garfield's past also garners him the unwanted admiration of Dave Childress, a burned-out,
alcoholicAlcoholism is a term with multiple and sometimes conflicting definitions. In common and historic usage, alcoholism is any condition that results in the continued consumption of alcoholic beverages, despite health problems and negative social consequences...
history teacher who carries and keeps guns at the school.
After Benny murders a rival tagger in cold blood, he inexplicably disappears, and Benny's severely unstable tag partner, César, takes over as leader and class antagonist. The conflict between Garfield and the K.O.S. escalates with the killing of Jack, Ellen's dog. César, after spraying cartoon graffiti depicting a dog with a "dead" face, is shot with a syringe filled with morphine attached to the end of an arrow. He passes out, and wakes up to find one of his fingers cut off. César later recovers the finger and it is reattached, though the letters "R U DUN" ("are you done?") have been tattooed onto it as a warning.
A student Garfield has tutored, a Chicana by the name of Rita Martínez, faces continuing abuse from both the K.O.S. and Childress, and drops out. The school administration is hopelessly mired in bureaucracy and unable to intervene. After Benny is found dead in the
Los Angeles RiverThe Los Angeles River starts in San Fernando Valley, San Gabriel Mountains, and Santa Susana Mountains and flows through Los Angeles County, California, from Canoga Park in the west end of the San Fernando Valley, 51 miles southeast to its mouth in Long Beach...
, apparently of a drug overdose, it becomes clear that Garfield has taken justice into his own hands, playing by the rules of the street in an intense contest with César and the K.O.S.
The K.O.S. plan to murder Garfield after they accuse him of killing Benny and amputating César's finger. The conflict comes to a head at Garfield's house, as the gang forces Garfield into a contest of
Russian rouletteRussian roulette is a potentially lethal game of chance in which participants place a single round in a revolver, spin the cylinder, place the muzzle against their head and pull the trigger...
with César, in which the latter's resolve is finally shaken, as Garfield gets through to him about the lost-cause lifestyle he has led. Hesitating at his turn, César watches as Garfield, offering to take his turn for him, takes the revolver and shoots himself in the head. Driven by his personal sense of honor and ignoring the protests of his horrified friends, César insists on taking his rightful turn and ends up killing himself in the same manner as his teacher.
Later on graduation day, Rita, who returns and completes her studies along with former K.O.S. member Stevie, offers a tribute to Garfield by reading an essay about him at
commencementA commencement speech or commencement address is a speech given to graduating students, generally at a university, although the term is also used for secondary education institutions. The "commencement" is a ceremony in which degrees or diplomas are conferred upon graduating students...
. The essay incorporates the theme of the
Pyrrhic victoryA Pyrrhic victory is a victory with devastating cost to the victor.-Origin:The phrase is named after King Pyrrhus of Epirus, whose army suffered irreplaceable casualties in defeating the Romans at Heraclea in 280 BC and Asculum in 279 BC during the Pyrrhic War...
, which Garfield had once explained to her in a tutoring session. The film ends on a somber note as Ellen, presumably disheartened at the incident, appears to leave the school (she throws her teaching certificate into a garbage bin).
Rating
The film was given an R-rating by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), for strong violence, strong language, drug abuse and brief nudity.
Cast
| Actor |
Role |
Samuel L. JacksonSamuel Leroy Jackson is an American film and television actor. After Jackson became involved with the Civil Rights Movement, he moved on to acting in theater at Morehouse College, and then, films. He had several small roles, before meeting his mentor, Morgan Freeman, and the director Spike Lee...
|
Trevor Garfield |
| John Heard |
Dave Childress |
Kelly RowanKelly Rowan is a Canadian television and film actress and former fashion model. She is best known for portraying Kirsten Cohen on the Fox TV series The O.C.-Personal life:...
|
Ellen Henry |
| Clifton Collins Jr. |
César Sánchez |
| Tony Plana Tony Plana is a Cuban-American actor and director. He currently plays Betty Suarez's father, Ignacio Suarez, on the ABC show Ugly Betty.-Personal life:...
|
Principal García |
| Karina Arroyave Karina Arroyave , is a Colombian television and film actress, likely best known as Jamey Farrell in 24.She has appeared in a total of 3 "dedicated teacher" films where the teacher tries to get the inner city students to want to learn...
|
Rita Martínez |
| Lobo Sebastian |
Benny Chacón |
Jack KehlerJack Kehler is an actor. He is sometimes credited as Jack Keeler.Jack has appeared in over 60 feature films, including Men in Black II. One of his most memorable performances was in film Love Liza as Denny, an energetic radio control hobbyist trying to help Philip Seymour Hoffman's character come...
|
Larry Hyland |
| Jonah Rooney |
Stevie Littleton |
| Demetrius Navarro |
Paco |
External links