AllMovie

In this gritty urban drama, a group of young people from a ghetto neighborhood where crime is a part of daily life find themselves on the wrong side of the law -- and under arrest. When their case goes before a judge, they're given one of two choices -- they can go to jail, or go back to school. Naturally, the kids pick the latter, but when they're sent to a school on the other side of town, they find themselves dealing with upper-class students and they find themselves outcasts. However, when the school sponsors a poetry contest, the street kids find that their hip-hop skills give them an advantage, as they use their talents for rapping and rhyming to create eloquent streetwise verse, and they soon find that shared creativity helps build a bridge between themselves and their classmates.