Riot (1996)

In April 1992, following the notorious Rodney King verdict, the streets of Los Angeles became a battlefield, the backdrop to four personal intertwined stories. In Gold Mountain, Jeff Lee and his parents run Good Neighbor Liquor in South Central L.A. Theirs is an Asian family of "old world" values at odds with a modern world-cultures that are about to clash in ways they never imagined. In Caught in the Fever, a day at the mall for Manuel Alvarado, the eldest son of a poor Hispanic family, and his girlfriend Iris, spirals into a nightmare as they're drawn into the out-of-control frenzy of a violent afternoon. In Homecoming Day, Turner Coates returns to the South Central hood of his youth to visit his mother - a homecoming overshadowed by an inescapable threat. In Empty, Boomer Phillips and his fellow LAPD officers are in a South Central restaurant when Boomer receives the command from his dispatcher to get out of South Central-but the command comes too late. Boomer's already in too deep, and there's no escaping the chaos around him. The Rodney King verdict has been announced. The violence advances block by block. Now, in the aftermath of an outrage, the lives of the Lee family, Carlos and his friends (Caught in the Fever), Officer Phillips, and Coates and his mother will cross with stunning impact. Each one of them will be pushed to their limits. Each will have their strength tested and their spirit challenged as a day like no other erupts before the eyes of a nation.