I hated Black & White for the same reason that I didn’t like Kids, which is a masterpiece in comparison. Both claim a gritty cinema verite style that is just as stylized and fraught with inherent bias as any other filmmaking technique. Unlike mumble core movies, which I love, this improv shows every sensational, negative thing that you can imagine in this fake real world: explicit sex, violence and death. Black & White glorifies the ugliest side of life and has a nihilistic resolution that claims to be, but is not emblematic of every black and white NYC experience. By claiming that the extreme is the every day norm, it is as prejudiced as Birth of a Nation. In Black & White, all the white kids are rich, promiscuous drug users who imitate black hip hop culture and crave sex with black people with one exception: Ben Stiller, who attempts to be dramatic. All the black people are rappers or athletes with one foot in the criminal world. There is no nuance. The director is only interested in prurient details. Every one wants to loudly and obnoxiously get the attention of the director’s proxy except Mike Tyson. I may be a prude, but I am a prude who will happily enjoy something ratchet if it is done well. Black & White substitutes celebrity for skill in the majority of its casting. Models can be smart, but casting Claudia Schiffer as a PhD student is too much. Even the fabulous Robert Downey Jr. isn’t worth a glance at Black & White. Skip it!