| Original Score: B+ | Feb 18, 2012

| Original Score: 3/5 | Apr 1, 2006

[F]or all its mis-steps, Rize gets by on enough jumping, pumping energy to fuel the national grid.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Dec 20, 2005

It's a well-known truth in the dance world that the body doesn't lie. As long as the characters in this film are dancing, we have little reason to doubt their sincerity. But once turned into talking heads, the dancers begin to sound like propagandists.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 5, 2005

A vivid portrait of art rising from deprivation and social hopelessness.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 5, 2005

Dancers move at the speed of lightening, the camera almost unable to keep up with some of the motion, it nearly mutating into a giant spectacularly vigorous blur.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 16, 2005

LaChapelle's powerful street-dance documentary Rize never lets us forget that its subjects are dancing in a war zone. But dance they do, in a kind of controlled frenzy, with music throbbing and limbs whirling and swaying and pulsing to the beat.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 8, 2005

With a running time of only 84 minutes, Rize frequently feels padded. However, there's no denying the fascination of watching these bodies in motion and the ascendency of a new, American-born art form.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jul 5, 2005

Clowning and krumping are urban art and art therapy in motion.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 1, 2005

It's a feel-good film that actually makes you feel good.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jul 1, 2005

It's an incomplete film. We don't get to know these kids well enough.

Full Review | Jun 27, 2005

LaChapelle reveals the captivating qualities of gritty street dancing, and his film is a touching story of hope, vitality and art rising from the bleakest conditions.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 24, 2005

While the dance scenes are intoxicating, on-camera interviews with the participants are sobering.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jun 24, 2005

Brisk editing, a poppin' hip-hop soundtrack, and plenty of off-the-hook dancing keep the energy high.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 24, 2005

Rize is actually a film about how art can be subverted and perverted by the same social and internal pressures that spawned it in the first place.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Jun 24, 2005

Rize soars on the wings of breathtaking images.

| Original Score: B+ | Jun 24, 2005

Tells this story simply and effectively, with an uncharacteristic restraint that prioritizes genuine sentiment over high-gloss style.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 24, 2005

David LaChapelle's documentary is, in its happiest moments, a summer party and a hip-hop milestone.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jun 24, 2005

Rize sees LaChapelle turning into a historian-sociologist who feels excitement and wants to share it.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 24, 2005

Rize is a compelling, bittersweet hybrid of a movie, one celebrating an enormous and hitherto unsung underground talent, while suggesting that art goes only so far in solving the enormous challenges of the underprivileged life.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 24, 2005