Se7en (1995)

What a great buy!
you get so much bang for the buck with this DVD. Not only is the documentary fantastic, but the supplemental DVD has recent interviews with lots of the superstar graffiti artists, breakdancers, and rappers. Well worth the money!!!!!

Old School
I had heard about Style Wars when i was in high school in 89', my friend had the hardcover book. Seeing the video just made me re-live those days of seeing trains with the fresh tags, and new drawings. I would highly suggest anyone who is into old school Graffiti then you must have this movie!!!!!!

An Outstanding Documentary
Style Wars documents the early graffiti scene in NYC and places it in the context of hip hop culture and the city at large. The film does a great job of conveying the passion graffiti writers have for their art, but is less successful at bringing into focus the conflicts between writers, parents, and city government. (The writers are never asked directly, for example, why they think it's acceptable to damage public property in pursuit of their art.) Nor is the connection between writers and b-boys and rappers drawn explicitly, despite the considerable time spent showing dancing. Nevertheless, there is a lot of good material here and, despite the filmmakers' obvious bias, all sides in this conflict are treated respectfully. The presentation itself is also quite artful, particularly the opening.

In addition to an extensive gallery, the bonus disc updates the story of 1983's Style Wars with interviews circa 2002. Not only do we get the artists' thoughts about the technique and history of graff and its relationship to music and dance, we get to hear what it meant to them then and now and how it changed their lives.