Original subtitles

Are you almost done?

Yeah.

I've only got this last tack to do.

Good.

Hey.

How are you feeling, baby?

I feel like pops is doing the electric slide on my back.

Hey, hey, hey.

It will get better.

Yes, it will.

Well, Calvin, did you give any more thought to speaking

at the gun buyback program?

Baby, I told you, that's a waste of time.

Uncle Curtis, don't say that.

What is it again?

Calvin, people turn in guns and we

give them these $50 gift cards.

And at the end of the day, there are fewer

guns out there, on the street.

And that makes absolutely no sense.

Curtis.

Baby, if you got a gun, you can get all the bank cards that

you want, and jewelery, and wallets,

and purses-- you heard me?

Buses, Mercedes-- they're yours!

I don't want to be around that kind of stuff, Aunt Ella.

If you change your mind, please,

don't hesitate to come down to the Help Center.

Hey, baby, why don't you ask me to speak

at one of your programs?

Well, Curtis, the main reason is

because I don't want you to come and speak at my little program?

Ow!

That hurt.

- You should let pops speak. - No.

Yeah. What about him?

I mean, he was, really, the mentor for DeShawn's--

No.

Listen, Curtis, no.

He knows.

Curtis knows I'm not letting him come down there.

I know what? What do I know?

Curtis, you know what you did the last time

you came to the Help Center? - I came what?

Where, baby?

Curtis, the last time I allowed you to come

down to the Help Center--

I ain't never been to the Help Center.

You threw away all of the clothes that

belong to the homeless people.

Oh, please.

Oh, you didn't?

Baby.

Baby, I did them a favor.

Please, the clothes smelled like piss and poverty.

- Uncle Curtis! - See?

See?

It did, baby!

I mean, come on, baby!

This is what I do.

You know, this is my life.

Helping people is what's in my heart.

That's what I do.

I got certificates for it.

I got to awards for it, Ella!

I got baskets of fruit, keys to the city--

a bunch of them!

Jingle, jangle!

I got ribbons pasted on the walls, you heard?

Right.

Why you won't let me go, baby?

Yeah, mom.

Come on, just let him go.

I think it'll be OK.

Curtis, baby, if I let you come down to this Help Center,

promise me, baby, that I will not

catch you doing anything crazy.

Baby, I promise with everything within little, old

me, you will never catch me.

Holler!

See?

[theme music]

I cannot believe how well this is going.

This is wonderful.

Thank you, God.

Thank you.

Thank you.

- Hey, baby. - Hey.

Hey, what are you doing down here?

Hey, CJ

Oh, I just came by to see how things are going.

They're going great.

Aunt Ella has done it again.

We've already collected 57 guns.

57 guns, CJ And look at this!

Look at this!

And a crossbow.

A crossbow?

Wow!

I always wanted a crossbow!

Wait, CJ!

There ain't nothing in it.

Baby, can you please put this back, behind the desk.

Where's Uncle Curtis?

Oh, he'll be right back.

Aunt Ella sent him to run some errands.

Oh, sent him on a wild goose chase to keep him busy, huh?

You got it.

Smart.

So how's the turnout been?

You know what, CJ?

It's been good.

Thank you, baby.

One less gun in the hands of the wrong people

equals one less accident.

And one less senseless act of violence.

Miss Ella.

That's the slogan.

Hey, Aunt Ella, uh--

these guns are empty, right?

Of course, baby.

Why?

Because, uh-- this guy, back here,

is looking kind of suspicious.

Oh, CJ, everybody that comes in here looks suspicious.

No, he does. He does, Miss Ella.

Maybe we should have the cops check him out?

No, no, no. We don't need the cops?

We don't?

I got this, you know what I mean?

I got this.

I'm the commissioner, all right?

Of fires.

Fires.

If he was on fire, I would feel safe.

Be quiet before he hears you.

Yo, I'm looking for Ella Payne.

I'm her nephew.

How can I help you?

What part of, I'm looking for Ella Payne,

can't you understand?

Can I do some for you, partner?

Not at all, little man.

Little man?

A little man? - Hello, sir.

I'm Ella Payne.

Oh, he got you.

Oh!

Hold on, player!

Paper.

Yeah?

Look, I'm here to work off some

of my community service hours.

Oh!

We're so glad to have you here.

Yes, ma'am.

OK.

Wesley Barrington Jr. Wesley Barrington Jr.!

Yes.

Yes, ma'am, but they-- - Oh!

They call me Little Deuce now.

Look at this!

I thought I recognized you, boy!

Lord have mercy!

Baby, listen, this boy used to just to pee in

all the Sunday school classes.

I mean, every Sunday he came, I would put him on the spot.

He'd just be, pee, pee, pee, pee.

It's so good to see you.

Maybe we should just call him Little Bladder, or maybe

Tough Pee, or something.

CJ?

You know what, CJ, baby?

Why don't you come with me to the store?

We should go to the store?

We need some more zip ties, right?

Yes

I mean, he looking like he want to be--

CJ

There's enough-- there's enough zip ties, baby.

I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.

I'm so sorry.

I'm sorry, Little Dude.

- It's Little Deuce. - Oh, that's it, baby--

Little Dude.

Listen, Wesley, why do you have 1,000

hours of community service?

I had some people try to get at him, you know?

I made some bad decisions, hung out with people

who made even worse decisions.

Everything all right now?

Yes, ma'am.

Yes, ma'am.

How's your father?

Oh, he's still running his company.

You know, 80 hours a week.

Same old, same old.

OK.

Ain't nothing changed, but time.

Well, Little Dude, we are so happy to have you here today.

And I am going to put you in charge of the bank cards.

Got you.

OK.

Listen, one firearm equals one bank card, OK?

And if anybody tries to take two--

Oh, there ain't going to be no problem because if anybody

try anything crazy, oh, they going to see crazy,

you heard me?

Oh.

Don't do that, baby.

Don't do crazy.

There's enough craziness already.

So you just calm down, OK?

Don't make have to call your daddy.

Huh?

Yes, ma'am.

Yes, ma'am.

I'm the law in here, Little Dookie.

It's Little Deuce.

Yeah.

Whatever.

[door closing]

How you doing?

Yeah.

What are they going to do with that?

Can't nobody fit in it!

Oh, here we go.

Here we go with the clothes again.

I guess I should do like always--

do help people.

Because, you know, I'm a public servant,

too, just like you guys are.

So you already-- oh!

Smell this.

Would you give that somebody?

Would you give that to your mother-in-law?

No!

Well, yeah, but it don't make no-- no sense.

Oh, I got this, y'all.

I got this.

Right there. OK.

All right.

Oh, look at that sucker.

Are you you want to give us this?

It's nice.

Look at the patina on it.

All right.

I'll give it to them.

This is three or four bank cards, right here.

Hey, you can take it.

Come on.

Bank card.

That's three or four, right there.

Three.

There you go.

Take that one.

And you know what? Here you go.

Here's a tip.

There.

Those are nice.

Look at you, man!

We going to get you a new press and curl, yeah.

You got that.

I'm down with them, though.

I can do it up.

That's another one, there.

Look at you!

Come on, now.

Give them up!

You get a few!

Here, you get your bank card!

You got a bank card!

I feel like Oprah in this piece!

Whoa.

Whoa.

I need those bank cards, old man.

What?

Who the hell are you?

I'm the one you're going to give

those cards to, you heard me?

No, I ain't heard nothing.

I'm Curtis Payne and I got the cards, you heard me?

No.

You heard me?

You heard me?

You heard me?

You heard me?

Did you hear me?

What are you doing?

It's good time I came down here when I did, Ella.

John Coffey, over here, tried to steal all the bank cards!

Hear that!

He is here to do his community service hours.

He's working them off, baby.

This is Wesley Barrington's boy.

Oh, that's Barry's boy?

This is the baby boy.

You talking about the little one?

This is him.

What?

What do you mean-- the one who used to pee his pants?

- Yes. - In your Sunday school class?

- That's him. - Yeah.

I also learned the books of the Bible,

but I see don't nobody remember, do they?

Wow.

Curtis.

Just look at it.

What a waste.

So did, uh-- the Bible didn't work out for you?

It did not?

86 books and none of them stuck.

Tim, Ruby-- - Curtis?

Nothing?

Karen?

Be quiet.

Be quiet.

Curtis, he is not here stealing bank cards.

I actually asked him to be in charge of distribution.

Oh, the irony.

Baby, distribution is probably why

he got the community service hours, in the first place.

You see, this is the very reason why I did

not want you to come down here.

This is why.

So could you, please, just go and take care of Calvin.

Yes.

Get-- get-- get his medicine for him.

He has blue pills, he has red pills, and he has yellow pills.

Baby, I'm handling this.

Look, I'm-- I'm handling this.

Look and see!

Curtis, these people are still standing-- they're standing

here, waiting on a bank card. Baby, where are they?

He gave them all away.

You little snitch.

- You gave them-- - Ah!

You know what?

I can't deal with this.

I got to go take care of my son.

He got pills!

He got blue pills, red pills.

What's the other color, baby?

Can we take your address and we'll send you a bank card?

Yeah.

Give us your address.

Thank you so much.

And there's lunch upstairs for you.

Please, stay, eat.

Please.

Thank you!

All right.

You did a good job.

I mean, look at all those guns we collected.

I mean, that was about what six--

six bullets for each gun.

Wow.

That's how many lives you saved.

I'm just glad the bank was willing to give us more cards.

I mean, this was a really good event.

We should think about doing it again, next year.

Not me.

I'll be off probation.

Thank God.

Oh, we have others.

Hi, guys.

Welcome!

Oh, welcome to the Help Center.

And thank you for coming to be a part

of the gun buyback program.

How can we help you?

We're trying to get rid of some bullets.

You mean guns?

Oh, no.

We're going to keep the guns, East Side Snitch.

Well, no, no, no.

This is not Snitch.

This is Wesley Barrington Jr. They call him Dookie.

Little Dookie-- Dook?

Duke?

Doo?

We heard you were down here.

Oh, Miss Ella, go get the cards.

Go outside and get the cards. - You know what?

I'll go get them. - Oh, no.

Both of y'all stay your asses right there.

Man, you better get your hands off of her.

Or what?

Or I'm going to show your ass what!

No, no!

Don't-- don't-- don't-- - Well, do something then!

JANINE PAYNE: Don't do nothing! Please!

I'm going to pop you.

- Please, please, please! - I'm going to light you up.

Whatever, man. ELLA PAYNE: No!

It take four of y'all to come in here with me.

ELLA PAYNE: No! JANINE PAYNE: Please, stop this!

Make it happen then! It really don't' matter to me!

- Say what? - Don't do it!

- Do what you got to do, man. - Shut up!

Handle your business, man.

I'll light you up.

Do what you got to do.

No!

Oh, god.

Please, please, please!

Please, don't do it.

I'm ready for mine.

Don't do this, don't do this, don't do this.

It's East Side for life.

I'm ready to die.

My blood is pumping strong and I've been living life wrong.

But when it's time for me to ride, I'll ride till I die.

Man, be quiet.

This ain't no time for no rapping.

Listen, put that gun away!

Now I am just sick and tired of mothers crying

because their sons are dead somewhere

because somebody shot them.

What the hell you know about it?

My son was shot.

That's what I know.

He was shot, right there, on the same street

he grew up on, playing.

He would play out there.

That's why I did this whole gun buyback program, sir,

so that this craziness can stop and these people

can get off the streets with these guns,

doing all this craziness.

So if you're going to take him out, then just come on,

do me, too.

And Shoot me, too.

Just lift me up.

Light.

Light what?

Light me up.

Light me up.

When you shoot people, you light

them up, not lift them up.

OK.

Well, whatever.

You know it, I don't know it. So you just come on.

Do what you got to do.

If it's my time to die, then I just fight until die.

What?

It's ride till I die.

Oh, y'all got a lot rules.

Listen, don't kill him.

Don't kill this boy.

That's what you all are to me--

your boys.

But I can tell you're hurting and you

just need to be loved, baby.

What happened?

I don't know what happened to you,

but I'm sure that there's some help out here for you.

You look like you have a future.

If you turn these guns in, we can work with you.

You just point?

You're going to kill him anyway?

You going to go and do it?

Drop the gun, Gutter.

Hey, fool, put the strap on the table, bro.

Thank you.

Thank you.

We have lunch upstairs for y'all, if y'all want.

You want to eat, since you're here?

For real.

[knocking]

Come in, come in, come in.

Pop. - Hey.

Been so long.

What are you doing here?

I thought you were supposed to be at the Help Center.

I am.

First of all, did you take your medicine?

You're supposed to take your blues, and your yellows,

and your reds-- whatever all that is.

- Yeah. - You get it?

Yeah.

Your momma sent me down here to do it.

Would you believe they ran out of bank cards?

Is that a trip!

It's hard to understand sometimes.

I kind of wish I would have gone.

Well, you still got time.

Well, you know, I got a lot of stuff to do around here.

I got to clean up. - Yeah.

OK. All right.

All right.

Man, I got to do my exercises.

I get it.

- Will you tell mom for me? - No.

I'm not going to tell her.

You tell her you're not ready.

Not ready for what?

The only way this is going to stop happening

in our community, son, is if people like you, who've

been victimized, stand up.

You got to.

You got to say something.

But we're not rushing you.

Yeah.

Well, it feels like it.

No.

No.

Not at all.

This takes time.

And we're giving you all the time you need, son.

You think mama's real disappointed?

Yeah.

I mean, how do you not order enough bank cards?

No.

I'm talking about coming to speak.

We got you, young man.

But I will say this, I better get back over there

because there ain't no telling what's

going to happen without me down there, handling stuff?

Hey, pop?

Yeah.

I'm going to come with you.

That's my man.

I would say little man, but you ain't my little man no more.

My big man.

You get locked up, you're probably

thinking about [inaudible].

Everybody in there is just trying to survive.

The Black Family Syndicate, East Side, West Side--

well, none of that matters.

S'up.

Oh!

Calvin, you made it!

This is my son.

Calvin, hi.

Yeah.

Dad talked me into it.

He's back there, bringing in some boxes.

He finally did something right, baby.

Sit-- stand right there, baby.

This is my son, Calvin-- the one I was telling you guys about.

And this is the reason why we started--

It's all right, mom.

I got it.

Look, I just want to say I appreciate you guys

being part of my mom's program.

You never know what a gun in the wrong hands

can do until it's pointed in your face.

And then you hear the shots.

And you ask yourself, is this really happening?

You wonder if the bullets missed.

Then you're lying there, on the ground,

looking up at the ceiling.

And you know you're hit.

You can feel your shirt getting wet.

And you wonder if you fell, or broke a glass,

spilled some water.

But you realize it's your own blood.

And it keeps coming.

And you keep bleeding.

And you get cold.

And-- and you die.

But you're still here, bro.

Man, when I got shot, a part of me died.

I lost something.

And I'll never forget that because--

because I got to live with this.

This is real.

So I thank y'all.

Thank you, baby.

Thank you.

Curtis Payne saves the day again.

Baby, what did you do?

For real.

Because you wasn't here all day.

I wrote Calvin's speech.

I helped him.

I know that's a lie because I heard the speech was good.

But he left out the part when he was at ICU

and he thought he heard the voice of God.

Curtis!

Come on now, I'm talking about God.

And it-- but actually, what it was is my voice.

I was telling him, get the hell up!

Run from the light!

Don't go to the light! it might be a trap!

I'm going to run from you before lightning strikes.

Then I'll just come over where you're at.

I just want to say thank you, Miss Ella.

Thank you, Wesley.

Thank you so much.

Oh!

So you guys about to roll up?

- Out. - Out?

Roll out.

Roll out.

And we stopped saying that in the late '90s, too.

Hey, hey.

You from West Side?

All day.

Oh, we heard about them West Side cats, huh?

Yeah.

I remember West Side cats.

Y'all used to get smoked by the East Side boys all the time.

I remember that.

Curtis?

They used to call us, what?

10 times a week.

10?

It was more like 30, actually.

30.

That's the truth.

Man, bump all the junk y'all talking about--

West Side been hard. - Oh, they hard all right.

Yo.

Hard to find out of the dark.

Excuse me, excuse me.

Curtis?

Curtis, would you, please-- don't do that.

Don't do that.

I'm going to hurt you after dark. - Oh, baby,

not in front of the kids.