"Biggie & Tupac": Nick Broomfield’s Film Follows Russell Poole’s Theory

Documentary filmmaker Nick Broomfield took on the Tupac and Biggie cases. His 107-minute film Biggie & Tupac, produced in England, screened in 2002 at the IDFA documentary film festival in Amsterdam. In the US, it had already arrived in theaters on September 20, 2002, through the small distributor Roxie Releasing (Box Office Mojo); in November, the US culture magazine PopMatters reviewed it.

An Ex-Police Officer as Star Witness

The starting point is former LAPD investigator Russell Poole. According to the account in the festival archive, he was pulled from the Biggie case after finding leads pointing to Suge Knight and corrupt police officers. The film views both murders as acts of retaliation stemming from gang and police circles, which were reportedly covered up later. It contradicts the Los Angeles Times report that Biggie paid for Tupac’s death.

Broomfield spoke with Knight in prison, with Tupac’s former bodyguard Frank Alexander, and with Biggie’s mother Voletta Wallace. Afeni Shakur declined an interview. PopMatters found little new ground: much of it repeated earlier reports, and the conversation with Knight was described as “uninformative and foolish.” The film is at its strongest where it asks whether the truth can still be determined at all.