THE GREAT HIP-HOP HOAX is a fascinating piece, showing how easy it can be to fool major players in the music industry, so long as one assumes the right accents and manners. Two Scottish students from Dundee reinvent themselves as Californian rappers, and prove so successful that they ended up finding a manager and obtaining a lucrative recording contract from Sony UK. What struck me most about the film was the ease with which they achieved their aims; no one really questioned whether their Californian accents were authentic or not, and assumed at face value that their backgrounds were legitimate. This documentary has a lot to say about stereotyping; how the right accents and background can prove invaluable in achieving success in the music industry. America is cool; Scotland definitely isn't. Perhaps the running-time is a little too long - the documentary runs out of a steam a little towards the end - but nonetheless it is a fascinating piece. The two students, interviewed specially for the piece, are a mixture of arrogance and diffidence; they don't regret what they've done, but seem surprised themselves at the ease with which they achieved what they did.