R.I.O.T.: The Movie

I saw the movie as soon as it came out, and it was well worth watching.The film centers around a policeman who is a single father, raising two children in a big city..dealing with gang pressure.After a gang raid, he decides to move his family to a small town in Oklahoma-but, his troubles soon follow him. Carman Licciardello (Victor Rizzo ) does a superb job of acting for his first movie.T-Bone, Sam J. Jones & Mario Licciardello were also well cast. Stephen Yake did an excellent job of directing. The movie was also accompanied by a wonderful musical score,including music video interludes by Carman Licciardello.A family movie at it's best.

As a fan of Carmans music, I was eager to see this movie. I was not disappointed, but I did realize that Carmans music, and Carman's movie are not good to mix. This is a good movie with a GREAT message of hope, and faith. Carman pulls a suprisingly good performance as Victor. But in the middle of an action scene, the movie go's on hold while another Carman music video takes over, that really has NO connection with the movie at all. This I believe was a mistake. Carmans videos are enjoyable, but not in the middle of an action scene. If this movie had been offered only as a movie, and the videos, offered only as a Music video, then Both would have been accepted with greater enthusiasm. I still enjoyed R.I.O.T., but wish it was re-edited and offered only as a movie.

This movie is excellent. It shows that you can't run from your problems. It's nice to see how someone else deals with the struggles in their life and how they face up to them.

The videos are excellent as well. Although they do chop up the movie a bit, but you get over it.

Christian Contemporary music has maybe only had a few major stars over time (Amy Grant, Stryper to name a few) but the biggest one is Carman, a singer from Oklahoma. He's been praising god with his musical talent since the 80s and had a huge following up through until the 2000s. On top of being a musician, He has also tried his hand and storytelling a few times, and R.I.O.T. is one of those times.

Carman plays Vic Rizzo, an inner city Chicago police officer who is trying to raise 2 kids without a wife (How many times are we going to have that single parent thing going?) And after a close call involving a gangbanger, Vic wants to escape the inner city to raise his kids in a much more peaceful community without gangs. But as Vic learns over time, You can run from your problems, but you can't hide.

Throughout the movie, Carman's music videos off the 1995 album "R.I.O.T." (Which stands for Righteous Invasion of Truth.) are interspersed at different moments, which tie into moments of the movie. For example, When Vic is discussing fear with his son, the music video for "No monsters" a song about the said topic, plays. and at the end, the music video for the song "Amen" plays.

So there are some negatives to this movie. For one, Carman's acting is razzie worthy but not the worst by all means. The gangbangers in the movie were pretty good actors but being that it's a family film, they cannot be as "bad" as they want to be. So swear words and other vulgar language that is commonly used isn't there. So you don't get that "American History X" or "Scarface" feel. You kind of get that Disney movie feel, which might turn off the target audience.

But the biggest negative (at least for me) is the music videos interspersed into the film. it's like a commercial break and it totally throws off the story's pace. you get to a good point and then carman starts singing while Vic's in limbo. And unfortunately, a 1996 release means VHS only, so unless you like fast-forwarding films, skipping the music videos is kind of tough. If the music videos were at the end of the tape, then that would be OK. I'm not saying the music videos suck (To be honest, carman made some of the most memorable music videos in CCM history) I'm just saying i'd rather watch the story all the way through.

Bottom line, it's not that bad of a movie for what it's worth, and if you happen to stumble upon a copy, it's worthwhile to see once. if it got a DVD release, at least then you could skip through the music videos.