SOURCE: Brent, Kristal. “Rocking the Cradle.” Washington Post (30 June 2001): C1.

In the following interview, Brent and Singleton discuss the visual imagery in Baby Boy.

When John Singleton—then a “bookworm” 21-year-old film-school student, by his own description—made Boyz N the Hood, his saga about growing up in south-central Los Angeles, he was instantly catapulted into fame and fortune. Made for ＄6 million, Boyz eventually grossed more than ＄56 million in the United States, and it garnered rave reviews. Because of it, Singleton became, in 1992, the first African American and the youngest filmmaker to receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Director (plus a nod for Best Screenplay).

This week came Part 3 of what he calls his “hood trilogy” (1993's Poetic Justice, with Janet Jackson and Tupac Shakur, was number two), and in it Singleton returns to a signature theme: the cycle of doom that perpetually threatens to engulf the...