50 Cent has been saying not to compare his movie to Eminem's, and now we know why. "Get Rich or Die Tryin' " is an ultra-violent gangster film that makes the R-rated "8 Mile" look like an after-school special.

Michael Gibson Curtis "50 Center" Jackson stars in "Get Rich or Die Tryin" Click photo for larger image. "Get Rich or Die Tryin' " Rating: R for strong violence, pervasive language, drug content, sexuality and nudity. Starring: Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson, Terrence Howard, Joy Bryant. Director: Jim Sheridan. 'Get Rich' Web site

It shouldn't come as a surprise, considering that it's the story of a gangster rapper stabbed and shot nine times told by a screenwriter from "The Sopranos" (Terrence Winter) and an esteemed Irish director, Jim Sheridan, who knows how to deliver violence ("In the Name of the Father").

The inevitable conflict here is that, despite 50 Cent's rap sheet and violent past, a good portion of his fan base hasn't even hit puberty yet. This movie is not for them.

The fans old enough to see "Get Rich," particularly the middle-class ones from the suburbs, are going to discover there's a big difference between hearing 50 Cent's back story in song and witnessing the bloodshed on the screen.

Their enjoyment of "Get Rich" may depend on how much they can get behind the character. Certainly, you can't help but sympathize with him as a boy (played by Marc John Jefferies, a dead ringer for a young 50). He doesn't know who his father is, and his single mom (Serena Reeder) is a drug dealer who actually tells him "Baby boy, don't grow up too much," just moments after she exposes him to a street scuffle with her rival dealers.

She comes to a violent end when he is 8, leaving him to fend for himself in his overcrowded grandparents' house. They set him up with a cot in the basement next to the washer and dryer. All he needs to see is a beat-up pair of hand-me-down shoes, and he's working the streets with dime bags by age 12.

50, who picks up the character as a teenager, has been accused of glamorizing the thug life, but you can't say that about this film. To get his gleaming white Mercedes, he has to endure drive-by shootings with the Colombians, solitary confinement in prison and some of the most brutal characters imaginable -- most of all, his boss Majestic (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje). 50 is portrayed as a strong, silent type, an anti-drug drug dealer who gets no thrill from thugging. All the while, we know from the beginning that he is going to end up lying virtually dead on the street.

50 Cent has been saying that about 75 percent of "Get Rich" is based on real life, and this movie is certainly going to make people curious about the other 25 percent. Like Eminem in "8 Mile," he uses a different name: Marcus rather than Curtis Jackson, and Young Caesar rather than 50 Cent.

Unlike "8 Mile," this film is not the rousing story of a rapper's rise, and that's part of its failing. Sheridan and company are much more enthralled by his thug life than his creative life, which kicks in after a prison stint has him seeking a career change (hard to do when you're in a drug gang). There isn't much of 50 rapping, and the film's abrupt ending stops way short of his fascinating career points, which include getting dropped from a major label after the shooting, offending the rap community with "How to Rob," feuding with the likes of Ja Rule, and ending up in a 52-room mansion.

50 does a decent job of playing a damaged character who keeps his emotions close to his Kevlar. His doesn't have much to offer his love interest, Charlene (Joy Bryant), and the birth of their child doesn't come off as the epiphany one might expect, judging by the actions that get him shot. 50's soft-spoken, sometimes mush-mouthed delivery (he does have a hole in his jaw and a bullet fragment in his tongue) is offset by the brilliant Terrence Howard, who saves him in an outrageous naked prison shower fight scene, and goes on to provide most of the laughs and excitement in the film.

To review, we have drugs, violence, profanity and male frontal nudity (not 50), plus a short, revealing sex scene and, oh yeah, a torture scene that rivals the one in "Reservoir Dogs." It's rough going and short of uplifting.

Now, what to do about the young hip-hoppers. They shouldn't see this in the theater, and when it comes on cable, either watch them every minute or go back to the rabbit ears.