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‘We Grown Now’ Review: Minhal Baig Lovingly Tells a Lyrical Friendship Tale Set in 1990s Chicago
In 'We Grown Now,’ 'Hala' helmer Minhal Baig returns with another gentle coming-of-age story, this one set in Chicago’s Cabrini-Green Housing Project.
As she demonstrated with her 2019 sophomore feature “Hala,” about a young Muslim girl’s daily life and dilemmas at the intersection of culture, religion and teenage anxieties, Baig has a textured, refreshingly unfussy way of perceiving coming-of-age stories, favoring intimate moments over explosive ones, with an assured handle on a sense of time and place. Playing best friends Malik and Eric, terrific young co-stars Blake Cameron James and Gian Knight Ramirez introduce us to the unassuming world of “We Grown Now” right at the start, as they push an old mattress down their Cabrini-Green apartment block’s staircase. In another, Malik shivers in fear when police officers cruelly storm his home during a random and unlawful search, rattling his sister, hardworking mom Dolores (Jurnee Smollett) and grandmother Anita (S. Epatha Merkerson) in the middle of the night.
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