Runtime:
135 minutes
This
was a Spike Lee joint
Starring:
John David Washington, Adam Driver, Laura Harrier, Jasper Paakkonen,
Ryan Eggold
From:
Focus Features
Yesterday I went to a new luxury theatre not too far from me to see this Spike Lee joint. The prices weren't cheap but at least there was no problems with the sound/picture and the staff all did a fine job... also the food was good. Considering the (effective) trailer for this movie seemed to follow me around for a bit earlier in the year, a theatrical viewing only made sense.
The movie is exactly as unsubtle as you'd expect from someone as provocative as Spike Lee and a topic as combustive as this one. I was not sure about the opening scene or even what the point of it was. After that, though... naturally it is rather bold. There are obvious connections made between Ron Stallworth infiltrating the KKK in Colorado Springs, Colorado in the 70's and the frightening resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan and similar elements in recent years... the comparison is blatant at the very end. There is plenty of slurs uttered that I will never repeat here and the white supremacists are all portrayed as blithering idiots, and almost all of them are unintelligent white trash.
Thankfully-at least for me-most of this did not become heavy-handed and so obvious that things became odious. Of course it was well-filmed and I was definitely interesting in the story that sounds too far-fetched to be true and yet actually did happen. From what I understand the basics were accurate and there were only some elements presented for dramatic effect, as you'll always get in “based on a true story” pictures. A big asset was the cast in general; they all were swell and thankfully they chose the right guys to play the true Ron Stallworth and the white cop that will impersonate him at certain points. John David Washington (son of Denzel, which was not a fact I learned until about a week ago) and Adam Driver both did a great job and they interacted with each other well as characters which were quite different from each other. I will also bring up Jasper Paakkonen, an actor I was not familiar with even if he is quite famous in Finland for starring in Finnish films I know little to nothing about. He did well in his Hollywood debut so I imagine he'll be in more high profile movies eventually. In addition, there are nice musical cues throughout.
Naturally, not everyone will be for this sledgehammer approach to the topic or how the movie's themes are robustly connected to what is happening in our world today. For me, this blunt examination of the topic managed to work, and I say that as a dumb white guy who is uncomfortably close to middle age. Of course I know this will play differently to a black audience but IMO, anyone can enjoy this motion picture.
No comments:
Post a Comment