A party in honor of the DVD release of “8 Mile” wouldn’t be complete without an appearance from Eminem – and rap battling.
On Thursday, Slim Shady himself will host the “8 Mile DVD Launch Party” at St. Andrews Hall in Detroit. Hip-hop artists D12 and Xzibit, who appear in the film, are slated to perform.
The DVD of the hip-hop drama starring Eminem will be released Tuesday.
Leading up to the event, radio stations around the nation have been holding freestyle rap battle contests.
The winners from each market are being flown to Detroit to attend the party and face off in the ultimate national rap battle, hosted by “8 Mile” actor Mekhi Phifer and Proof from D12.
The winner will be awarded the opportunity to record a demo tape at the Record Plant Recording Studios in Hollywood, Calif.
The “8 Mile” DVD will include five new rap battles between the star and other performers as they trash-talk each other with rhyming profanity and insults.
Viewers can choose to watch the sequences in censored or uncensored formats, Universal Studios Home Video said.
An exclusive video of Eminem’s “Superman” song also will be included on the DVD. Filled with sexist slurs and bitter humor, the track from his Grammy-nominated album, “The Eminem Show,” is about wooing women for sex with empty promises and then cruelly dismissing them.
Directed by “L.A. Confidential” filmmaker Curtis Hanson, “8 Mile” chronicles an amateur rapper’s frustrations with stage fright and his family’s poverty. The film collected nearly $116 million at the domestic box office.
“The Eminem Show,” released in late May, was last year’s best-selling album with more than 7 million copies sold.
His other recent CD, the soundtrack to “8 Mile,” was the fifth-highest selling of the year, with more than 3.2 million copies sold.
Eminem was nominated for an Academy Award for “Lose Yourself,” a single from “8 Mile.”
