Good story, Not enough for a whole film

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

'Blood In Blood Out', or 'Bound by Honor' as it is sometimes known, this is a solid film whatever the title, tracking the experiences of two Latino brothers and their cousin, each of whom go in diverse directions after a run-in with the police estranges them from each other. The film is very slow to warm up, only really taking off once the trio are arrested, but from then on there is a nary a dull moment to be had as the arrest influences one brother to become a policeman, the other to become an artist and the cousin to embrace jailbird life. Despite making very different life choices, fate eventually brings the paths of the trio together with each having to contend with having the same blood despite being on opposite sides of law and conventional living. If there is one thing to hold against the film, it is that it spends more than twice as much time on the cousin in jail as it does on the two brothers, but then again, his experiences in prison deliver all the highlights of the film. From attempted rapes to hidden messages to prison riots, the film depicts the jail experience of the 1970s in incredible depth with warring racial factions and unwritten codes of conduct that all abide by. The film is also blessed by one of Bill Conti's tersest music scores to date, a terrific supporting turn from Delroy Lindo and some remarkable artwork, including a full scale wall mural. Clocking in at close to three hours, this is not the lightest or breeziest film to get through, however, the ample length allows one to get under the characters' skins in a way that a shorter film could not have done half as well.

Spanish versus blacks versus white supremacists in a 1970-1980's melting prison pot just ready to boil over. Three young men living in a working class east L.A. neighborhood defined by the many gang- banger's who want to build their reputation for being the biggest bad asses are ready to rumble and look for any excuse to get it on next to their "homies".The three main characters are aspiring artist, lover and drug addicted Cruz (Jesse Borrego), ex-boxer turned law enforcement officer Paco (Benjamin Bratt) and angry mixed breed Spanish/White Miklo (Damian Chapa) who grow up together in a gang but as life takes its course over two decades these three men fight their own demons alone and sometimes pitted against one another.If you want to fight the bull sometimes you get the horn and Miklo who is struggling to gain acceptance of his mothers Spanish heritage because his skin color is white is constantly fighting the race card on all three sides of the Spanish, white and black prison gangs. Miklo is the one of the three young men who ends up in prison and must gain the trust of his Spanish prison gang members if he is going to survive his years in imprisonment. Although Damian Chapa's acting as his character Miklo was exceedingly over emphasized as an angry "Chico" we just never see a two dimensional character. On the brighter side the two other main characters Cruz (artist) and Paco (cop) evolve into men with a conscience and so they periodically reflect back on their younger gang war years as a brotherhood that must be respected but also realizing it was in their past and not in their future.There are some other great supporting cast members such as Raymond Cruz as Chuey the druggie, Victor Rivers as Spanish prisoner Magic Mike, Danny Trejo as Spanish prisoner Geronimo, Carlos Carrasco as Spanish prisoner Popeye, Ving Rhames as a prison gang intelligence detective named Ivan, Delroy Lindo as Bonafide the leader of the black prison gang, Tom Towles as white supremacist Red Ryder, and Billy Bob Thornton as white supremacist Lightning. As you can see by this depth of the talent pool most of whom went on to greater Hollywood fame, the director Taylor Hackford utilized his young talent pool to his full advantage and to the viewers greatest benefit.This film is a tad over 3 hours long, but surprisingly, there are no dead spots throughout the film. The intertwined stories of the 3 Spanish homies Cruz, Paco and Miklo are blended so well that we the viewer can only anticipate what is going to happen next, and to our surprise everything is not as it seems in their Spanish neighborhood, nor in the prison where Miklo grows into a hardened lifetime criminal battling the blacks and Aryan racists proving himself over and over to favor his Spanish heritage gang members.It took me 23 years to finally watch this film but I believe that Blood In, Blood Out has withstood the test of time and the storyline is still relative today as it was three decades ago when it was released in the early 1990's. So many great male stars went on to have great movie careers and this film could only have helped build their film resumes with such strong personal acting performances in a tough gang related film such as Blood In, Blood Out. I give the film an 8 out of 10 rating

For 3 years, my wife wanted me to watch this movie and i hesitated. It sounded like just another gang movie and i wasn't interested in watching another movie like that. Then when i was sick one day it came on cable and i decided to watch it. As soon as the first 1/2 hour passed, I was sorry I didn't watch it sooner. This movie was well done! A very good depiction of street and prison gangs..(the fact that some of the actors and crew either were involved in gangs or had done time in jail helped make some of the roles more believable).The saddest character in the movie is the main protagonist Miklo Velka. despite his mother being a brown-eyed, blk haired Mexican, his white father's features constantly make him an outsider in his own community and his willingness to do whatever it takes to be accepted by his own people ends up having disastrous consequences for all involved in his life in the 12 years that the film takes place.One other thing I saw in the movie that really surprised me is when Popeye tells Miklo that he cannot get mad at another Latino in jail because they were both from rival gangs. In prison, they have to unite if they want to survive. I saw that as a unity born out of need to protect themselves.If you are Latin, regardless of type (cuban, Puerto-Rican,Peruvian,Mexican etc) see this movie.

Oh dear...what a mess.This film is so incompetently written that it could be used masterclass in how not to write anything at all. For a start it is repetitive beyond all belief: same riffs on blood ties, brothers, mothers, fathers and cousins etc etc etc ad nauseam throughout. Tedious to a degree that is extraordinary that it passed the producers.Secondly, the script has two pitches: loud and violent. That also makes it very boring. It is obvious how things will be shown in these two modes. A violent film can work on other levels but the writers are so inept that it escaped them to give this a few more tones.Thirdly, the story lacks precision as if it lacked a good editor. Therefore it has adopted the familiar course of amateurs, and that is to add everything in the story without giving it a balance and counter balance. There is no editorial overview of how to shape material within a reasonable time period. It is also very very long ..."Anna Karenina" is long, but that was by Tolstoy and he has some claim to be one of the greatest writers of all time.Fourthly, the actors: oh well, and the report card is depressing. Basically two modes of action. The leads are all generally terrible, especially Mr Chapa, whose performance might be compared to a guard dog with distemper. Such monotony should not be viewed in a feature film.As with anything that that exemplifies all that is detritus in film making, there are so many other things to mention but space precludes a fuller list of its faults. The music for instance, with its deliberate sentimental Spanish guitar style in the few quiet moments showed all the artistic intelligence of a fast food restaurant franchise.Almost anything on earth is better than wasting the time that is this dreadful waste of one's own too short life.