‘Nas: Time is Illmatic’ Review: A Masterpiece

The best works of art stand the test of time—as the artist ages their work stays frozen in time like a lost boy, forever maintaining it’s purity.

Nas’ “Illmatic” is one of those works of art.

Released 20 years ago, “Illmatic” is one of, if not, the most influential Hip Hop albums ever. The album forever changed the landscape of the genre and “Nas: Time is Illmatic” takes you behind the hard hitting lyrics and chronicling what built Nasir Jones into the man that would deliver one of Hip Hop’s most enduring albums, however, it does very little to display the impact the album had and continues to have on the genre.

“Nas: Time is Illmatic” gives you a peak inside the mind of Nas, the man, the artist. It His journey begins in Queensbridge. Born from a hardworking mother and a musician father who traveled a lot, Nas did not have the hardest childhood. Although his father was not around much, he was encouraged to read and his mother always worked to give Nas and his brother Jabari the necessities.

But New York in the eighties was not the dandiest of places to live—especially in Queensbridge Housing Projects.

With an aptitude and passion for Hip-Hop, Nas decides to tell the story of what’s really going on in New York, delivering gut-checking lyrics that quickly garner the attention of other rappers and more importantly…record labels. It is hard to not break some necks with lines like “when I was twelve I went to hell for snuffin’ Jesus.”

If this reads a little stale, it is because the documentary is on cruise control during its 74 minute runtime. Now, it is far from a terrible and even further from great but “Nas: Time is Illmatic” feels like a quickly put together research paper done the night before its do, all of the major events are there—but it lacks any real insight that would convert a Nas detractor into a believer and a Nas fan into a fanatic.

The documentary does a good job of pacing you through how Nas became the rapper he is and how his iconic debut album came about, there just is not enough that displays just how the album has forever left its fingerprint on the Hip Hop genre. There are small audio clips from young heavyweight rappers like Kendrick Lamar and J. Cole talking about their thoughts on the album, them not being on screen takes away any real legitimacy those comments have.

Where the film succeeds is telling Nas’ story. Anyone who has never seen or Nas is giving a course in “Nasology 101” as it goes through events and people that shaped the man that created one of Hip Hop’s holy grails. It works well as a supplementary piece to “Illmatic,” which seemed to be the goal of the piece—but anyone who knows a lick about Hip Hop knows a documentary about Nas and Illmatic needs to be just as ill and just as timeless.

“Nas: Time is Illmatic” will be available on VOD platforms starting October 3.