Tag: Spike Lee

American Utopia

Posted on by victorfraga

The performance of the eponymous David Byrne stage show was filmed at New York City’s Hudson Theatre shortly before the pandemic hit. “Thank you for leaving your homes”, says the British-American singer during its intro – an especially poignant remark in hindsight.

The artist takes centre stage in a concert that features himself, a band of 11 musicians… and pretty much nothing else. As per his explanation, the goal was to create a musical experience that retained only the vital elements – which turned out to be only the players and their instruments. Apart from a curtain made of chains that conveniently hides the backstage while also providing access to it, the viewers have nothing to look at.

Byrne and co. stun and dazzle as a borderline-possessed chorus line, performing some of the most cherished tunes of the British-American indie rock songbook, while allowing space for cherished but lesser-known tracks and oddities. For example, watch out for the rendition of Lazy, the singer’s collaboration with Brit house duo X-Press 2, and witness the crowd go wild. While its origins and name suggest a focus on Byrne’s latest album – entitled American Utopia – the tracklist is heavy with songs of his former band, Talking Heads. This means the audience gets to see energetic renditions of all-time classics such as Born Under Punches (The Beat Goes On), Burning Down the House and the incredibly prescient Once in a Lifetime.

The decision to include these songs elevates the concert from a simple promotional tool for his latest work to a tribute to his extensive career. It also makes the production a spiritual sequel of sorts to Stop Making Sense (Jonathan Demme, 1984), often described as “the best concert film of all time”.

Byrne embraces the comparison wholeheartedly. Elements such as the suit attire and the band members entering the stage piecemeal are callbacks to the earlier film, but the perspective is completely different. In Stop Making Sense, Byrne was a young paranoid warning the audience of the perils of consumerism. In American Utopia, he is an old man looking at the man-made carnage of contemporary life and calmly saying there is room for change.

There is also a new political focus to this performance that prevents it from being a nostalgia fest. Deft recontextualisations turn the freakish dance tune I Zimbra into a communal anti-nationalistic cry, while the new song Everybody’s Coming to My House becomes a celebration of immigrants. “Most of us are immigrants”, Byrne says, as he introduces the song and points out his Scottish origins, “and we couldn’t do without them”.

Byrne is a white man who partly constructed career out of Black rhythms. He fittingly addresses the issue of institutionalised racism in the US. In one moment, football quarterback and political activist Colin Kaepernick gets a shout-out during the rendition of I Should Watch TV. Also, in an inflammatory cover of Janelle Monáe’s Hell You Talmbout, Byrne lists names of Black victims of state-sanctioned murders, including Brazilian politician Marielle Franco.

Lee’s treatment of this material is a show in itself. His insertion of footage of the victims’s mothers during the Janelle Monáe cover drives its point with force and precision. Elsewhere, he and director of photography Ellen Kuras have plenty of vantage points to watch the concert, filming from behind the curtain, from above the performers and even in their midst, running around with a handheld camera, blurring the line between audience and performance.

Relatability is at the heart of both the performance and the movie. Human connection is its main theme. Byrne is an empathetic, professor-like narrator with the brain to hand – literally. He dances with a brain model, a symbol of constant learning and endless possibilities. American Utopia should leave viewers with a sense of awe as well as very sweaty clothes.

American Utopia is on VoD and DVD on Monday, December 14th. Ir has enough groove to shake the pandemic blues off viewers. It also carries a powerful message reminding them that there’s a lot of work to do in this world.

Do The Right Thing

Posted on by victorfraga

A day in the life tale of a racially divided block in Brooklyn, the one-of-a-kind talent’s fourth film rightly catapulted his rise to fame and ushered in a new era for black film in America.

This is Spike Lee at his best: direct, unflinching and didactic. He implores the US to find its better self, and to rise above the hatred and to sort out its differences. In the light of his recent, far more politically pointed yet structurally looser works such as Chi-Raq (2016) and BlacKKKlansman (2018), Do The Right Thing stands out for the way it feels both contained and generous, its plot slowly simmering to boiling point while allowing a whole world to teem and bustle within its frames.

In one of the best bits of self-casting in cinematic history, Spike Lee plays the protagonist Mookie, working in a pizzeria in a predominantly black neighbourhood, hereby acting as a bridge between the Italian and African-American community. He also embodies the tensions of a black man in a neighbourhood where all the economic power seems to be contained in the hands of others — both Italian and Korean, with nothing left for the African Americans.

Danny Aiello excels as Mookie’s boss Salvatore, whose pride in his role as the block’s pizza provider borders on the patronising. While not as blatantly racist as his son Pino (John Turturro), he seems wilfully blind to his own prejudice. While often seeing himself as the voice of reason, he quickly rises to anger when his authority is challenged, displaying the privilege of the white man in relative power. Mookie resents his role as the poorly paid delivery man, constantly telling the mother of his child (Rosa Perez) that one day he’ll quit and finally make something of himself.

This central conflict is played out against the wider backdrop of community life, panoramically staged. It often feels like it is channelling the fleeting, joyful and observant poetry of Langston Hughes, the great African American writer who dazzlingly teased out the contradictory realities of black life in America. Whether its the middle-aged men on the block, who shoot the breeze all day while sweating in 100 degree Fahrenheit heat, or the old drunk, acting like the conscience of an entire nation, or the jazz-like rhymes of Samuel L. Jackson as a radio host, Do The Right Thing could have worked as a mere observational piece like Smoke (Wayne Wang and Paul Auster, 1995). What Lee does that’s so clever is weave these different, contrasting lives into the narrative itself, until clashing ideologies finally force the dam to break.

The film functions like a Russian doll of racial conflicts. Episodic scenes such as the Italian-American driver getting his car sprayed by a loose fire hydrant, the white brownstone owner told to leave the predominantly black neighbourhood and Mookie’s own conflicts with his Hispanic mother-in-law, are mini-stories within the main story, showing how on hot days, any small conflict can potentially spill into violence. The spark in this case may be Buggin’ Out (Giancarlo Esposito) demanding a black person adorn the walls of Sal’s pizzeria — which features only famous Italian-Americans such as Al Pacino and John Travolta despite catering to a mostly black clientele — but on another day it could’ve been something else entirely.

Perspective is everything. Its constant change is brilliantly reflected by Ernest Dickerson’s cinematography, excellently using skewed angles to portray differing viewpoints in the neighbourhood. This is complemented by the fine deep shots and wide angles, allowing side characters to constantly flit in and out of the background, giving the impression of a corner constantly bustling with life. Then in one brutally effective sequence, characters talk directly to the camera, shouting every racist epithet under the sun, showing how prejudice is something of a performance in itself; a tale as old as time, perhaps impossible to unlearn.

When s**t hits the fan and the police finally arrive and brutally strangle Radio Raheem (Bill Nunn) to death in a scene that horrifically predates Eric Garner’s murder by about 25 years, it becomes clear that the issues facing this neighbourhood cannot be solved within the neighbourhood alone. These are structural problems built upon a fundamentally racist society. Do The Right Thing is so brilliant precisely because its representation is so knotty and its conflicts seemingly unsolvable. It’s not a fairy tale like To Kill A Mockingbird (Robert Mulligan, 1963) where racism can be evaporated through taking your jacket off and giving a good speech.

With everyone so set in their ways, finding a way through can seem almost impossible. But it is not the role of a filmmaker to provide solutions, but to start the kind of conversations that can lead to solutions further down the road. Spike Lee possibly does this better than anyone. With the jury still out on whether Mookie did the right thing by throwing the garbage bin through the pizzeria window, its the kind of conversation-starting cinema that’s needed now more than ever.

Despite its essentially timeless nature, the only thing that seems dated is the portrayal of the Korean shop-owners, put in to provide extra colour but lacking a own perspective of their own. While Lee is usually so good at transcending basic stereotypes (consider the heft given to the complex racial past of the Italian-Americans) the Asian characters have no part to play apart from owning a shop while withstanding prejudice from both black and white patrons. It just goes to show that even Spike Lee has a lot of learning to do. We all do.

The 30th anniversary edition of Do The Right Thing is in cinemas on Friday, August 2nd.

BlacKkKlansman

Posted on by victorfraga

Spike Lee is in great shape again, after the relatively disappointing Chi-Raq (2016). BlacKkKlansman follows Black detective Ron Stallworth (John David Washington) as he and fellow Jewish officer Flip (Adam Driver) investigate the KKK, and succeed to foil a terrorist attack. The action is based on Stallworth’s book, Black Klansman, and it takes place in Colorado Springs in 1979. Stallworth was the first black detective/police officer in the city. The film was produced by Spike Lee and Jordan Peele (director of the acclaimed racially-charged horror Get Out, from last year).

Nigger and kike make a wonderfully dynamic duo. They are intelligent, nimble and able to mimic each other with perfection. Ron speaks to the KKK leader David Duke (played by Topher Grace, pictured above) on the phone using his real name pretending he’s a white racist keen to join the group, while Flip “incorporates” Ron and attends the KKK meeting in person. They are in serious danger if their real identities are revealed to the white supremacists, who hate both black people and Jews. Ron and Flip complement each other with perfection, with their dirty blackness and Jewishness.

The “twoness” described by Black American philosopher W.E.B. Du Bois is the central pillar of the film: how can you be American and Black? But this isn’t the only duality highlighted here. Ron reveals to his activist girlfriend Patrice (Laura Harrier) that he’s a “pig” (a cop), and she confronts him with the following question: is it possible to make changes to a racist system from inside (i.e. by working for the police) or should one fight from outside? She urges him to abandon his job and to join the revolutionary Black Panthers, on which he has been grassing.

Spike Lee isn’t just a filmmaker. He’s a great maestro. BlacKkKlansman is a philharmonic orchestra with a multitude of players and instruments working in perfect harmony. The photography, the actors, the editing, the montage and the soundtrack are all immaculate and exquisite. The colourful clothes are extremely colourful and elegant. The fact that the film is set in the 1970s helps to justify the plush costumes (in Chi-Raq, set in the present day, the attires came across as a little too extravagant). Plus Lee has mastered filming black skin in the chiaroscuro (during the Black Panthers meeting inside a hall in the beginning of the movie).

The montage is phenomenal: a character played by Harry Bellafonte narrates witnessing the lynching of Jesse Washington (who had his fingers and testicles severed before being burnt alive, his body parts being sold as souvenirs and pictures being turned into postcards), and the images are contrasted against a KKK meeting, as they put on their hood, get riled up and chant. All of this happens to the sound of an electric music score. It reminded me a lot Raoul Peck’s equally impressive montage techniques in I Am Not Your Negro (2017).

At the end of the film, Spike Lee shows real and very graphic footage of the Charlottesville neo-Nazi demonstrations, including the moment racist James Fields rammed his car into a crowd of counterprotesters, killing a woman and injuring 35 people. Next, we see Donald Trump describing both sides as violent and claiming that many of the white supremacists were “very nice people”, and present-day David Duke praising the president’s demeanour. The American flag then fades into black and white. An urgent eye-opener and call-to-action.

BlacKkKlansman showed in the Official Competition of the 71st Cannes Film Festival, when this piece was originally written. This writer was enthusiastically rooting for this film, but sadly it did not win the Palme d’Or, taking home instead the Grand Prix, widely perceived as second highest award. It wasn’t the first time that the Festival overlooked Lee: nearly 30 years ago the clear favourite Do The Right Thing (1989) also failed to win the Palme.

BlacKkKlansman is out in cinemas across the UK on Friday, August 24th. It is out on VoD on Monday, December 24th.

Oscar’s too white, Carnival’s too black – or not?

Posted on by victorfraga

Last year the entire world was pointing fingers at the Oscar competition for being too white, with black artists like Will Smith and Spike Lee even boycotting the event. It must be so refreshing to live in Brazil, a nation that proudly embraces its blackness, exuding melanin through Carnival and samba. The largest country in Latin America is home to the film Black Orpheus, an adaptation of the Greek tragedy to a nearly all-black community in Rio de Janeiro. Spike Lee himself picked the classic from 1959 as one of the 87 films every aspiring filmmaker must see. Brazil must be a role model for black cinema, right?

DMovies begs to differ.

There is a large disconnect between the perceived colour of Brazil abroad and on Brazilian soil. While most of the world sees Brazil as a largely black nation, the majority of Brazilians (and by extension the Brazilian media and Brazilian cinema) refuse their black heritage, and consistently deny blacks a prominent role in society as well as on the silver screen. In other words, foreigners see Brazil as black and exotic, while most Brazilians (particularly the middle and upper classes) vehemently refuse to identify themselves as black.

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There is no shortage of colour and movement in Black Orpheus

The black sheep

Black Orpheus is a very unusual film because – despite critical and commercial acclaim – it feels very foreign to Brazilians. The French-Brazilian co-production was directed by French filmmaker Marcel Camus and it feels unnatural, contrived and difficult for Brazilians to relate. The film was entirely made on Brazilian soil and nearly all the actors and scenography are Brazilian, but it still feels very European or even American. This is because of the French director’s foreign gaze.

This is not to say that Black Orpheus is a bad film. The movie has outstanding qualities, such as the astonishing cinematography of the favelas, the mountains, the beach and Carnival of Rio de Janeiro. The images are plush, vibrant and almost dreamlike, without being cheap and vulgar. The music score is at once soothing and energetic, composed by the Brazilian musicians Antônio Carlos Jobim and Luiz Bonfá. These songs have since become Bossa Nova classics.

The movie is based on the play Orfeu da Conceição by the Brazilian poet Vinicius de Moraes, which is an adaptation of the Greek legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, set in the modern context of a hilltop shanty town in Rio de Janeiro during Carnival. Orfeu (Breno Mello) is engaged to Mira (Lourdes de Oliveira), but he falls in love with a countryside girl called Eurydice (Marpessa Dawn), who arrived in Rio in the build-up for Carnival. She is fleeing from a man who is trying to kill her, and she soon also has to face the fury of jilted fiancee Mira. She then disappears, and Orfeu sets off to find her.

At the end of the film, Orfeu communicates with Eurydice in a Umbanda ritual. The young female, who turns out to be dead, talks through the mouth of a possessed female shaman in a beautifully staged religious ceremony. Umbanda rituals are profoundly marginalised and viciously frowned upon in Brazil.

Samba, Carnival, beach, the Sugar Loaf, boisterous people: all the clichés of Brazil are present in Black Orpheus. People are dancing and prancing to the unrelenting sound of guitars, drums and cuícas. Everyone is happy and sensual, and smiling is almost compulsory. The film has a joie de vivre and naivety akin to Jean Renoir’s French Cancan (1954) and perhaps to Hollywood musicals. Brazil is a an exotic country to be relished and savoured, and the movie is an enjoyable experience throughout, even if at times the music feels repetitive.

Nearly all characters are black in Black Orpheus. Sadly, the thought of an all-black Brazil makes most Brazilians cringe. While warm and welcoming on the surface, Brazil is a deeply racist country.

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Carnival isn’t always a place for celebration, in Black Orpheus

Racism is subtle but widespread

Spike Lee once said that “the United States is 20 years ahead of Brazil when it comes to ending racism.” Brazilians of mixed heritage tend to affiliate themselves to their white side, which the American writer Robert Stam calls the “whitening” tendency. Had Obama been born in Brazil, he would likely identify himself as white.

Brazilian black actor and cinema veteran Antônio Pitanga recently claimed that the black family is never represented in the Brazilian media and cinema. Instead, flat characters and stereotypes (such as the black singer, the black footballer, the black maid, etc) sparsely populate Brazilian films and soap operas. Black religions, such as Umbanda, suffer from even more discrimination.

The Brazilian submission to the Oscars last year The Second Mother (Anna Mulayert, 2015) has also been accused of racism. The film sets to uncover classism, discrimination and lack of social mobility in Brazil. Despite the social denunciation tone, the absence of black characters is conspicuous throughout the movie.

Unsurprisingly, none of the actors in Black Orpheus had much of a career after the film, and most fell into oblivion. Mello acted in a few films in the 1960s, but very few Brazilians would recognise his name. DMovies hazards a guess that these actors would have been much more successful if they had pursued a career outside Brazil.

Today is the first day of Brazilian Carnival, the largest street party in the world. The festivities are European in their roots, but deeply black in their heart. Let the world remember Black Orpheus, Samba and Tom Jobim not just this week, but also after Carnival. Let the world celebrate Brazil’s blackness and multi-ethnicity. Let’s also hope that Brazilians join in.

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This piece was originally published in February 2016, during the launch of DMovies. It has now been republished in order to celebrate the rerelease of Black Orpheus.

Just e-mail us the name of the director of Black Orpheus at info@dirtymovies.org in case you wish to win three DVDs/Blu-rays and soundtracks of the movie (UK only) – courtesy of the Criterion Collection.