The idea was a hybrid of narrative musical and documentary, having hip-hop pioneers play themselves in a loosely scripted story shot entirely in the South Bronx, the Lower East Side, and MTA subway yards.

Wild Style centers around a Bronx teenager named Raymond (Lee Quiñones), who under the pseudonym "Zoro" is a celebrated but anonymous graffiti artist.

Raymond scorns a group of graffiti artists, known as the Union Crew, who have turned their talents to legitimate, commissioned murals on the walls of playgrounds and business establishments.

Their graffiti murals attracted the attention of Virginia (Patti Astor), a journalist, who brings the uptown hip-hop culture to the downtown art world.

There are a series of encounters with graffiti artists, rappers and breakers, leading up to a giant rap-break concert in a Lower East Side band shell decorated by Raymond.

[14] Phelim O'Neill of The Guardian noted that despite the low production values, "nothing else comes close to capturing the atmosphere of the early days of hip-hop and spraycan art..."[15] Reviewing the film for BBC, David Mattin wrote that "Wild Style is a cult classic - indisputably the most important hip hop movie, ever.

"[6] The plot of Wild Style is fairly loose and the film is more notable for featuring several prominent figures from early hip hop culture such as Busy Bee Starski, Fab Five Freddy, The Cold Crush Brothers and Grandmaster Flash.

Highly regarded hip hop albums such as Illmatic by Nas, Midnight Marauders by A Tribe Called Quest, Black Sunday by Cypress Hill, Resurrection by Common, Big Shots by Charizma, Mm..Food by MF Doom, Check Your Head by Beastie Boys, Beat Konducta by Madlib, Jay Stay Paid by J Dilla and Quality Control by Jurassic 5 have used samples from the film.